Cupid Has Crappy Aim
by Quis Custodiet
Summary: Kim is dating Eric much to the chagrin of one love struck sidekick. However an unexpected opportunity presents itself and Ron screws up his courage for the confession of a life time. Too bad he gave it to the wrong girl.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1 – An Indecent Proposal

-

It was a bright and breezy Sunday summer afternoon. The sky was blue, the air was crisp with a hint of dew, and a gentle breeze flew in to the Stoppable household from every available open window. Hardly a corner of the modest home had been left untouched by the undeniable wholesome scent of summer that seemed to pervade nearly everywhere during the month of July in their quiet mountain town. That is to say, except for one corner of the Stoppable _Maison_ – the domain of the overwrought prince of the castle, Ronald Dean Stoppable.

Ronald Dean Stoppable was a boy who went by many names. He would often switch them up and change them about as the mood seized him. Some day he would be **The Ronster** – a manic and hip (in his own mind) fellow who was a hit with the ladies. Other days he was **Rondo**, the tough (yet lovable) dude who had all the answers. Some days he would even be **Prince Aloysius Joseph Stoppable III, Defender of the Kingdom and Heir Apparent to the Mole-Rat Throne… **

But honestly, he didn't talk about _that name_ very often in public.

Today however, he wasn't anyone special. In fact, he was about as un-special as a young man could possibly be. Today, his name was merely _Ron Stoppable_ and he could sum up what that meant with a very short list.

_Sidekick._

_Neutered "Best Buddy"._

_Loser._

_Snappy Dresser._

Ron flipped over on his side and remarked to his pet mole rat, an altogether bizarre creature for a bizarre young man, "Well, I suppose one out of four isn't that bad, is it Rufus?"

Rufus hadn't been privy to the demented workings of Ron's inner monologue, so he didn't have much to offer on the subject other than a moments respite from eating some cheese and a quizzical look. Of course, Ron's questions tended to be more rhetorical in nature anyway; this time being no exception.

"Augh! Who am I kidding Rufus! Even I know that one out of four is an E! Heck, it's practically an E minus." Ron wailed at his diminutive pet.

Rufus waited for a moment, checking to see if Ron was actually paying attention to him, and then once he had determined that his owner was indeed wrapped up in another hormonally fueled bought of self depression, went back to peacefully eating his cheese.

Now, before you judge Rufus as a cold-hearted pet that didn't love his caring owner, you really needed to understand both the severity of Ron's emotional upheaval, as well as the _duration_ of said teenage angst.

The pity hung so thick in the air you could cut it with a knife – a dull knife even. In fact, if you had attempted to cut _Ron_ with a knife, it was most likely he would have bled tears. The depth of the young mans sorrow and the breadth of his accusations against the seemingly unfair universe were both creative as well as a little appalling and frankly it was starting to get to Rufus. Mole rats unfortunately weren't blessed with exceptionally long life spans, so they tended to not sweat the small stuff (and it was all small stuff), but Ron on the other hand… Well, his moaning and tormented agony had been going on for nearly three weeks and although Rufus _did_ hold some compassion for his tow-headed master, he _was_ getting pretty sick of it.

Hell, Rufus was a _mole-rat_; try competing with an entire colony for the affections of a single queen and then get back to him. Mole-rat society could be pretty devastating to your psyche if you happened to be young and romantically inclined – Rufus had learned this first hand before he had ended up behind the pet counter at Smarty Mart. It was probably one of the reasons why he ate so much cheese – substitution of affections, if you will.

Still, despite all this, _something_ needed to be done. It didn't look as if Ron was capable of coming up with some sort of plan on his own – indeed it seemed that he had actually preemptively abandoned planning in favor of reacting to an imminent rejection that hadn't already happened. It hurt Rufus's brain to think about it, but it was Ron-logic, so that was to be expected. In any case, Rufus gently tried to push and prod his master towards, at the very least, _considering_ some sort of action over the entire matter that didn't consist of just wallowing in his room all day. So far his guidance had met with little success.

"Ron!" came a voice from downstairs. It was his mother.

"Ron!" she repeated, "I need you to do something for me! Come down here!"

Ron wearily arose from his bed and crept across his room like a marionette that had lost it strings. He opened the door, not bothering to call back to his mother and made his way to the living room.

"What is it Mom?" he asked, making sure that his voice sounded sufficiently pained. He wasn't above attempting to elicit emotional sympathy when chores were on the line.

Meryl Stoppable just looked at her son with a disapproving eye. She wasn't sure what had gotten into him recently, but his constant moping around the house seriously bothered her. She had decided that his complexion recently was starting to mimic that of Bueno Nacho's trademarked "cheese food substitute" and being rather old fashioned she knew instinctively what the cure for that was – Going outside. Meryl Stoppable was an odd woman for the 21st century, the kind of woman that still believed that there was very little you couldn't fix by just pushing your kid out the door and telling him to "go play".

"Here Ron," she said as she shoved a large brown paper sack into his hands.

"Take these to the Possibles. They left those dishes over here last week."

Ron looked at the contents of the bag he was holding. He remembered those dishes. Those traitorous dishes and the way they had practically leapt from his hands, dumping their contents all over the assembled diners at the Stoppable family table. Oh he remembered it well…

"_Ron", James Possible had said, "Could you pass the mashed potatoes?"_

"_Sure", he replied as he reached his arm across the table for the steaming hot bowl of starchy goodness._

"_And then…" Kim continued her story from earlier, "Eric asked me to go steady with him! Isn't that great?"_

Ron wasn't sure what exactly had happened next, but he was dimly aware that Dr. James Possible _didn't_ appreciate wearing mashed and steamed tubers as a chapeau.

"_You made me look like a fool,_" Ron Stoppable lamented into the paper bag.

To their credit, the dishes remained silent.

Meryl Stoppable stared at her son for a moment and then gently pushed him towards the door. Ron, even at his best, was an odd child and she had long ago learned to overlook some of his more… startling eccentricities.

"Now go Ronald, and take your time… or hurry back if you want to clean the garage."

Ron may have been a melodramatic fool at heart, but when it came to choosing in between spending time with his best friend and hitherto object of undying affection, or doing manual labor, the decision was easy.

_Oh the crosses us sensitive types bear._

-

Kim Possible sat on her porch enjoying the soft summer breeze as it caressed it's way across her skin. She had both of her arms behind her, leaning backwards – it was comfortable and she could feel the warm sun heating up her exposed face.

"_Where's Ron? His Mom called and said he'd be right over._"

Kim glanced at her watch and then back and forth down the street. A look of impatience spread across her face and she leaned forward to cup her head in her hands.

"_If Ron doesn't show up soon, I'm going to have to leave. I'll have Mom tell him he's welcome to join Eric and I at the mall…_"

Somewhere, deep down inside, Kim knew that despite her straight-A scholastic record, she had just thought something _very, very dumb._

Which was unusual because Kim Possible was actually a really bright girl. Not just intellectually, but emotionally as well. She had a deep-seated empathy for people that allowed her to bring out the best in not only herself, but also everyone around her. It showed through the most when she was on one her many missions, but also it had worked it's way into other aspects of her life, like her friendships and of course her work on the cheer squad. Although it would probably make Bonnie Rockwaller bite off her tongue and die, Kim had often been referred to as the "natural leader" type and part of this was due to this amazing ability she had to read people.

With all this being true, it should be no surprise then that it was only by a supreme act of willful ignorance that she was able to maintain her "relationship" with her best friend, Ronald Stoppable, in the face of his complete and utter apathy for her newest (and in her opinion greatest) boyfriend Eric. Oh, it wasn't that Kim didn't _know_ that Ron didn't like Eric; that was something she was able to pick up on right away. It was just that she seemed to gloss over the finer points of their interactions recently – the skull boring daggers Ron stared into the back of Eric's head, the overly dramatic and soul rending sighs, the wistfully mopey, "Whatever Kim's" that Ron seemed so readily armed with in retaliation to her insistence that they "talk".

Yep. Kim for the most part just _ignored_ as much as she could and whatever she couldn't ignore she was determined to forget. It wasn't that Kim hated Ron, quite the contrary actually, it was just that if she was eventually forced into a confrontation where she had to choose between her best friend and her boy friend she knew somewhat instinctively that everyone would be walking away a loser.

"_I just wish Ron would grow up a bit. We're not little kids any more and we can't spend every day just playing together. I have a boy friend now and he needs to understand that._"

It was, simply put, the cold, brutal, and frank truth – at least the way Kim saw it. She was convinced (or at least, had convinced _her self_) that the reason for Ron's overly emotional behavior recently was because of some sort of "best friend" crisis. He probably felt as if he was competing with Eric for a place in Kim's life. And while this was _technically_ true on one level (Kim did, only have so much time in the day to give), there were parts of Kim's life that belonged only to Ron – so he shouldn't get jealous.

"_If I could just get him a girlfriend…_"

Kim stopped cold on that line of thinking. Something about it bothered her.

"_Ok, how about this – a friend that is a girl who likes him…_"

She wrinkled her nose and pouted slightly. That didn't sound much better.

"_Hmm… I got it! A friend, that happens to be a girl that will spend time with him when I want to go out with Eric!_"

For some reason that she couldn't put her finger on this sounded a lot better to Kim than her first two attempts. After a little bit of contemplation she eventually decided to attribute it to the fact that it was by far the most _plausible_ situation she could imagine. After all, getting Ron a real, bona fide girlfriend was something she wasn't sure she could do.

At least before she died of old age.

"_Or is it…_"

Suddenly a devious thought sprung up in Kim's mind and she reached into her pocket for her cell phone to place a call.

"Hello, Tara? It's me Kim."

-

Ron Stoppable stood in front of the wide doors of a non descript house in a tidy little subdivision of Middleton Colorado. He could hear the music and the talking coming from inside – they were the sounds of merriment, the hallmark of people having a good time.

He was absolutely positive that he didn't belong here.

"_Why did I even accept this invitation? This is just going to suck on so many levels…"_

Ron didn't like to admit it, but the main lure had been that this was the first party, first birthday party even, that he had been invited to as anything other than "Kim Possible and Guest" - He had the invitation in his back pocket to prove it.

Ron also had another reason for showing up tonight. He had found out that the birthday girl had wanted to keep the celebration somewhat _small_ – no one was invited except a few close personal friends and her fellow members of the cheer squad. This meant, that for once, Ron ought to be able to enjoy a few hours of Kim's company without either having to dodge giant mutated badgers, or having to deal with that smarmy creep Eric.

"_I can't go on living like this – I have to put my foot down and let Kim know the score. It's either her best friend or her…_"

Ron couldn't even _think_ the word, so he just let it drop.

He carefully peeked into one of the front windows, trying to see if anyone was around and then resigned himself to knocking on the door. A few moments later it opened and the birthday girl and good-natured blonde cheerleader, Tara Strong, greeted him with a smile.

"Hi there Ron!" she chirped at him full of cheer.

Ron looked nervous. He got along well, at least as well as he could, with his fellow cheer-squad members, but he never did quite feel completely comfortable around them without Kim present.

"Hey there Tara… happy birthday!"

Ron had brought a gift for Tara (from Smarty Mart of course) and awkwardly thrusted it through the doorway at her like he was trying to ward off a stampeding bull.

"Um… thanks Ron!" Tara replied, looking bemusedly at the oddly wrapped package.

"Garfield" said Ron.

"Huh?" replied Tara.

"That ones Garfield," Ron stated pointing to the wrapping on the present.

"And that's Hagar the Horrible – more like terrible if you ask me, and over here is Family Circus, but I don't really get that one. Oh over here…" Ron took the box from Tara's hand and flipped it over, "Ah yeah! That's Boondocks. It's hysterical. In an angry black man kind of way."

Tara let out a giggle and took the package back from Ron. Most people stopped wrapping presents in the comic pages when you were five and coming from nearly anyone else Tara would have thought it kind of bizarre, but with Ron… well it was still kind of bizarre, but sweet also.

"Well, come on inside Ron," Tara offered, "My Mom didn't cook any food, but she went out and bought a couple of party platters from Bueno Nacho. Just let me put this over on the ta-"

Tara turned around, but didn't see Ron anywhere. Then another voice from her left, a person who had been hiding behind the door just incase she had been needed, spoke up.

"He went right for the low class Mexican food. What did I tell you? That boy's predictable."

Tara giggled and set her gift down.

"Are you sure about this Kim? I mean… Yeah I kind of like Ron, but I'm sort of dating Josh right now and… well… not really, but maybe soon…" Tara's voice trailed off.

Kim could tell that Tara was wavering in her commitment to her diabolical plan. It had taken Kim no small amount of effort to convince Tara that not only did Ron _secretly_ like her – but that he was just _too shy_ to come out and admit it on his own. She felt somewhat bad lying to the girl like that, but she thought it was for the best. After all, Tara (for some God unknown reason) did have a bit of a romantic crush on Ron and Ron… well dating a cheerleader could only improve his standing amongst his peers.

"I'm totally sure Tara. Ron really likes you, he's just shy…" Kim felt a twinge of regret as she continued, "All we have to do is put him into a situation where he can overcome that shyness and the rest will come naturally!"

Tara looked up at Kim with her big blue eyes full of doubt and even a little expectation.

"Are you _sure_ Kim?" she pleaded in her little girl voice.

"Um… yep! Totally! Absolutely!" Kim responded.

"_Oh, I am so going to hell for this…_" she thought to herself.

"Just wait here and I'll go work on setting up things like we planned…" Kim stated.

-

"Hey KP!" Ron said in a cheery voice that actually made Kim take a step back.

"Hey Ron!" she replied, "You sound like you're in a good mood, what's up?"

Ron shrugged and then took another bite from the Naco he had been munching on.

"Oh you know… good tunes, good food, good company. The Ron-man is all about a good party."

"_And Eric isn't here so I might actually get to spend some time with you!_"

"Awesome Ron. Hey can I talk to you for a minute?" Kim asked, putting her arm on Ron's shoulder and leading him away from the rest of the partygoers.

"_Hmm. What's going on with Kim? My bad news detectors are going all haywire!_"

"Uh…" Ron began nervously, "What's going on Kim?"

Kim sat down next to Ron and leaned closer to him so that they could talk semi-privately.

"Ron… what would you say if I said there was a girl here tonight that liked you?" she asked tentatively.

Ron's mind reeled. He wondered what Kim was getting at.

"Uh… Cool? Wait – Who?"

"Well, let's just say… She's a cheerleader."

Ron started to formulate a mental list.

"_A cheerleader – like Kim._"

"And she's actually liked you for a long time."

"_Do you mean like best friends since pre-K?_"

"And she's even kind of dating someone right now, but might be willing to break it off with him for a little bit of Ron-shine."

Alarms and buzzers were flashing inside Ron's head.

"_Wait… Kim is dating Eric! Oh my God, Kim wants to break up with Eric and go out with me? This isn't bad news! It's BADICAL news!_"

Ron's face instantly broke out into a huge grin.

"Well, I'd say to her – why doesn't she give the Ron-man a whirl and see if she likes the ride?"

Kim made a face at Ron, arching her eye in incredulity at the obvious smarminess of his statement.

"Look, it's a little bit more complicated than that Ron. You see, she's really shy and she wants to know how you feel before she says anything." Kim said.

Ron nodded with sage-like wisdom.

"So, we're going to have to play a little game. Let me explain it to you…" Kim said.

-

Explaining the finer details of "seven minutes in heaven" to Ron hadn't been one of the high lights of Kim Possible's young life, still she had managed to complete his education with a minimal amount of emotional and mental scarring – mostly to herself.

It was a party mixer type of game, and mostly a harmless one. Basically it involved throwing two people, generally a male and female, chosen at random into a closet together for seven minutes. What they did inside that closet was their own business, but people were generally allowed to make scandalous assumptions – so long as it didn't get out of hand.

Of course, when it came to choosing people "at random", Kim had explained to Ron that the fix was in - when he got chosen, the person to step into the closet with him was going to be his "mystery woman". She had expected Ron to show a little resistance to the idea, and on some level deep down inside she was actually slightly disappointed that he hadn't. He even looked a little eager when he had selected the short straw from Kim's hand – hell, he had practically _sprinted_ to the closet.

"_What has gotten into that boy?_" Kim idly wondered to herself.

"Ok ladies!" Kim spoke up, "Time to see which one of us is going in too!"

The looks on the assembled faces of the Middleton High Cheer Squad ranged from apprehensive to down right disgust. Kim had reminded them under her breath that they had been pretty excited about the game until just a few seconds ago when they had found out which of the few male guests had been selected. Personally Kim thought they were just being babies – even if they _did_ have a chance of being selected, and Kim had made sure that they didn't, it wasn't like Ron was going to grope them or feel them up.

It was _Ron_ after all!

Just as Kim was about to offer the first lot, the doorbell rang.

"Oh, I better go get that…" said Tara as she took off for the door.

Kim rolled her eyes and proceeded to draw the first straw. It was, as she had known it would be, very, very long.

"Oooh! Bonnie!" squealed Tara from the foyer, "I'm so glad you could come!"

Kim looked over her shoulder and saw that her co-captain, high school arch-nemesis and queen of the food chain, Bonnie Rockwaller had just arrived at the party. She had actually been surprised when she had arrived earlier and Bonnie wasn't here – her and Tara were best friends after all. It turned out that Bonnie had some sort of family engagement that evening and was just coming a bit later – fashionably so.

Bonnie Rockwaller strode into the living room, took one look at the assembled girls and then bluntly asked, "What the heck's going on here?"

One of the other girls piped up, "Seven minutes in heaven!"

Bonnie raised her eyes a little bit and a few of the other cheerleaders giggled and a couple of them let out some low "Oooh's". All in all, it was a pretty salacious atmosphere.

"Take one Bonnie!" said one of the cheerleaders.

Bonnie just rolled her eyes and said, "Who's in the closet?"

There were no immediate answers, just a lot of giggling. Everyone knew how Bonnie Rockwaller felt about Ron Stoppable – so even entertaining the prospect that they would be locked in a closet together for seven minutes seemed down right hysterical.

"Just take it Bonnie!" one of the girls said, followed by a slew of more giggling and a chorus of "Yeah! Do it!"

Bonnie Rockwaller, while being the top of the food pyramid at school, had one major weakness – she was _completely_ vulnerable to peer pressure. In this sort of situation, there was nothing she could do but bite the bullet and hope that she didn't get the short end of the stick.

Literally.

Bonnie sauntered over to Kim and took a lot from her hand, then looked back at her assembled teammate and did a "Who care's?" shrug of her shoulders.

Kim passed out the rest of the lots and then all the girls got together in a circle and compared the relative lengths of their straws. Several of the girls were obviously out right off the bat – Kim being one of those. Eventually it became obvious who the winner was.

"Bonnie?" asked Tara as she shot an accusing glance at Kim.

Kim, for her own part, was completely baffled. She hadn't meant to give Bonnie the short lot – in fact she was down right positive that she had saved it for Tara. Did she make some sort of mistake? Did she…

"_Oh crap!_" Kim thought to herself as she realized her error.

When she had gone to make the lots, all she had available were those stupid bendy straws from the Bueno Nacho party platters that Tara's mother had bought. She had lined them up and then taken a sharp kitchen knife and sliced them ever so slightly in a diagonal pattern moving from right to left. The end effect _should_ have been a slight graduation in lengths of the straws, with the smallest one safely tucked away to be presented to Tara. And it probably would have even worked out that way if she hadn't made a minor cock-up and counted out the wrong number.

When Bonnie had arrived and been given a lot, Kim only had enough straws in her immediate hand for the amount of girls that had been present when she had started to pass them out. Because of this she had reached into her pocket and simply just grabbed another straw from the original batch she had cut. The thing she hadn't realized was that instead of grabbing a straw, she had actually grabbed the fully extended bendy part of one of the straws that she had already cut. It was, unfortunately for everyone involved, a rather small scrap and even more unfortunately it was sitting in Bonnie Rockwaller's hand.

Kim barely had time to register what was going on, let alone make up an excuse, any sort of excuse, that would get Tara into the closet with Ron. She looked on helplessly as the rest of the girls (sans Tara, who was equally as shocked as Kim) grabbed Bonnie and pushed her towards the closet. Faster than anyone could blink the door was open, Bonnie was forced in, and then just as quickly closed. The members of the cheer squad, with the exception of Kim and Tara, could barely contain their giggling.

-

Ron had been trying to listen to what was going on outside the closet for long minutes now to no avail. He felt for sure that he had been in here already for at least an eternity, so by the time Kim joined him he'd have been waiting for… well, a very long time. It wasn't that he was complaining exactly, and really, what did he have to complain about? His beautiful and stunning best friend was practically jumping through hoops just to get him to confess his love for her.

Suddenly he perked up – he could detect movement on the other side of the door and he heard the handle starting to move. There was a bright flash of light as the door swung open, but he couldn't see anything due to the fact that his pupils were dilated – still he did feel the warmth of another body being pushed up against his. There was an uncomfortable silence as he contemplated his next move.

"_This is it man! This is your chance – tell her how you feel! Oh… she smells nice. Wait! Head in the game Stoppable!_"

Ron tried to calm himself by slowing his breathing and concentrating. It was damn hard for him to do both because the closet was so small and he could feel Kim's body pressing up against him. He wanted to just reach over and hug her right now, but he knew from the way that Kim had been talking before that it was going to take more than that for him to win her over. He wasn't an idiot, he knew what Kim wanted and he was going to have to dig deep within himself to find it - Sincerity.

Slowly, he cleared his throat and then began to talk.

"Look, I know things haven't been all that great between us recently…" Ron knew he had hit the mark when he felt Kim's body tense up.

"But I want you to know something – well several somethings actually."

Ron was desperately trying to get the words out and to not concentrate on Kim's hot breath on his face.

"First off – I think you're an amazing person, and I don't just think that because you're the most beautiful girl in the school. I mean that from the bottom of my heart, I think who you are as a person is just amazing."

Long weeks of anguish had given Ron plenty of time to come up with exactly how he felt about Kimberly Anne Possible, and he was going to make sure he did his damned best to let her know.

"Other people might not notice it, but I'm always looking at you, always watching you and… I know you – I know how hard you work to always do your best, even though people think that your best comes so easily – I know the truth. I know that although sometimes you might seem a little insecure, or worried about your popularity, that deep down inside you're a sweet, kind hearted girl."

Ron heard a slight gasp come from Kim as he said these words to her – he mused that he must have touched a nerve.

"I guess what I'm trying to say is… even if nothing ever comes of this, I want you to know how I feel about you from the very bottom of my heart."

Ron leaned in closer now to Kim. She seemed to be shaking slightly and he could feel the warmth of her body against him.

"I love you," Ron pronounced in a soft voice and then almost hesitantly he leaned in and kissed Kim – miraculously finding her lips in the dark. It was a sublime moment of joy for him that he thought would go on forever.

In reality, however it lasted only about 10 seconds. For some reason Kim, who had merely just stood there in shock as Ron kissed her, had decided to pull away. Ron was confused, and certainly wasn't prepared for what she said next.

"Ron… Don't kiss me!"

He would have sworn that Kim sounded a hell of a lot like Bonnie Rockwaller before he lost consciousness due to the pain emanating from where her knee had suddenly impacted with his groin.

-

A/N:

I hope everyone enjoyed the first chapter of "Cupid Has Crappy Aim" – my little foray into the vastly under-represented RonBon pairing.

Basically how this story came about is after I finished my huge Rongo story, "Ron Stoppable, Ultimate Monkey Master" I was looking for something else to write and Bubbahotek suggested a comedy. Now, I'm not confident on my ability to write comedy as much as I am drama, but I'm hoping that I can at least do goofy and sweet.

In any case, please review – this first chapter was an excruciating 5,000 words for me to type coming right on the coat tails of my 25,000 word final chapter for my last story. So I can't promise any super speedy updates, but who knows? I do intend to finish all my stories some day!

Thanks,

QC


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2 – The Secret Life of Bonnie Rockwaller

-

"_Why am I still embarrassed!_" groused Bonnie Rockwaller as she slumped into the overly cushioned armchair.

Tara's disastrous birthday party had hours since passed away and Bonnie was still trying to deal with the fallout. To say that thing had gone _sour_ would have been putting it mildly.

When the door to the closet had finally been opened, Bonnie had stood there paralyzed with fear and indecision. What if someone had heard Ron's confession? How would she ever live it down? What if… What if…

What if they thought she had made out with him?

It was a possibility almost too gorchy to contemplate.

At first there was a light tittering of laughter from the assembled cheer squad girls, but then a loud voice broke over it.

"Ron! Are you ok?"

To Bonnie's surprise the concern for Ron wasn't coming from Kim, it came from Tara.

That's when she took a moment to look down at the pathetic sight beside her. Ron Stoppable was there, on the closet floor, huddled over in the fetal position and doing his best to keep half a Bueno Nacho party platter from making a sudden reappearance. Bonnie's hyper-social mind instantly calculated the damage her proximity to Ron was currently doing to her popularity and she did the only appropriate thing in the situation – she practically leapt away.

"That'll teach you to get fresh with me!" she screamed in Ron's direction as she set about doing a visible inspection of her clothing, acting as if she was looking for lice, tears, or Stoppable-borne cooties.

"Bonnie! What did you do to him?" This time the voice _was_ Kim's. It seemed that she had finally gotten her mind around the fact that her best friend was laying on the ground in agony and the one who had likely done it was Bonnie Rockwaller. Kim wouldn't likely cop to it, but she was a pretty repressed young lady, so she took nearly every opportunity she could to get into it verbally with Bonnie – it was one of the few cathartic releases she had.

Bonnie just sneered at Kim, "Nothing that the little pervert didn't deserve K! Why don't you keep him on a shorter leash?"

"What ever Bonnie!" interjected Kim, "Do you expect us to believe that _Ron_ of all people tried something on _you_!"

Bonnie looked around at the assembled faces of the cheer squad. Kim obviously didn't believe her, but that was a given – Kim wouldn't believe her if she said the sky was blue and Josh Mankey was gay (and Bonnie was pretty certain on both counts). The other girls on the squad seemed to be indifferent, if not a little incredulous – this didn't bode well for Bonnie. It wasn't until she saw the look on Tara's face that she really started to worry. Her tiny blonde best friend looked like she was about to cry.

Bonnie Rockwaller was a girl in crisis, torn between doing what she felt was right by her best friend and doing what she knew she had to in order to maintain her social standing. She hated being in situations like this, and while they didn't happen very often she knew automatically what the outcome was going to be.

"That _loser_," she began, the venom practically dripping from her voice, "tried to kiss me! I don't care what you think K, I am out of here!"

It was a lie of course - He hadn't _tried_ to kiss her at all, he had actually succeeded. However Bonnie didn't feel particularly compelled to share that bit of information with the rest of the school. She looked around, studiously avoiding the shocked and hurt look on Tara's face, and then pompously left the house, slamming the front door behind her.

She was in full "Queen Bonnie" mode when she pulled out of the driveway, the tires from the convertible her father had bought her squealing into the night. The anger in her system was practically at the boiling point and before she knew it she found herself idling at a stop sign three blocks down the road, slamming her fist into the rim of her steering wheel and cursing loudly.

"That idiot! That jerk! That asshole!" she muttered in between clenched teeth.

"How could he do that? He ruined Tara's birthday!" she accused while looking at herself in her rear view mirror.

Of course Bonnie knew that it wasn't _Ron_ that had ruined the birthday celebration, but her and her own self-serving antics. She rationalized it away however by claiming that she had an image to maintain and that if Ron hadn't kissed her, then none of this would have happened.

"_Why did that loser kiss me?_" she thought to herself as she put her car back into gear and continued through the subdivision.

"_I've never been anything but a bitch to him._"

It was true, for the most part. There _had_ been a couple of times where Bonnie had been on more… civil terms with Ron Stoppable, but for the most part they had been few and far between. It wasn't really that she had anything against him, it was just that she was at the top of the food chain and he was at the bottom and that was the way things worked. It was the way things _had_ to work. It's one of the lessons her father had taught her about the real world; for every person at the top there had to be a hundred at the bottom. Maybe it wasn't nice, but it was neat and orderly and as her father insisted, the way the world worked.

"_People at the bottom are losers Bonnie," her father had explained._

"_They'll never really amount to anything and the reason why is because they don't __**want **__to amount to anything. They're lazy, they don't work hard, they don't protect their status or their positions and because of all that they __**deserve **__to lose." Richard Rockwaller had stated._

Bonnie remembered at the time desperately not wanting to be a loser. She had asked her father what she needed to do.

"_It's easy dear, you're a Rockwaller – just act like one!_"

Bonnie had spent the next 10 years of her life acting out her father's advice and she was determined to keep it up for at least the next 50. After all, it _had_ worked so far – She was the queen of the school, she held court every day amongst her subjects and everyone who was anyone knew that Bonnie Rockwaller was destined for great things.

Thinking back on her father's advice she started to come to terms with what had just happened. It was unfortunate, sad really, that she had to cast such a pall over Tara's birthday party – but she'd make her petite friend understand that she had to do it. In fact, it was really the only thing she _could_ do under the circumstances. It was obvious wasn't it? By the time Bonnie had gotten home, parked her car and wandered into her bedroom she had nearly put the entire evening behind her.

Nearly.

"Arrrrrrrgghhh!!! STOPPABLE!" she growled at her ceiling.

Bonnie didn't know why, but there was something about what Ron had done to her tonight that completely infuriated her. At first she had wondered if perhaps the entire thing had been a set up designed to embarrass her. She quickly discounted that idea; she had arrived late and in fact there was no guarantee that she would have arrived at all – it would have been too much left to luck just to make her look like a fool.

"_Maybe Stoppable was just trying to mess with me – to get me back for all the times I've called him a loser_" she thought to herself, but that didn't ring true either.

There was something about the way that Ron had spoken to her that made it seem unlikely that he had just been playing her. No, there was something else…

And then that's when Bonnie realized it.

"_Oh my God! That dork was telling the truth!_"

Bonnie had been so shocked at the time that she hadn't really been paying attention to a lot of the little things that Ron had done when he had been confessing his feelings to her. Like the way his voice had cracked at the beginning, the nervous tone filled with apprehension while he spoke, the way you could feel that he was searching deep down inside himself for the right words to say. The way he had kissed her…

"_Head in the game Rockwaller!_"

Bonnie got up from her chair, walked across her room and flopped onto her bed. The more she thought about it, the more she was convinced that she was right. It was sort of strange at first, to realize that something had taken place right in front of her that she was only able to see after the fact – it was almost like watching your own life on instant replay in your own brain and then finally catching on to all the little nuances that you missed during the excitement.

"_Excitement?"_

No, she concluded, it wasn't excitement that she had felt, but _nerves_. Bonnie Rockwaller was never nervous, in fact she was only barely aware of what the word meant. Nerves and indecision and confusion were for people who were losers. Winners, like herself, always knew what to do and when to do it. That's why they were winners after all.

Still, when he had spoken to her she had felt something in the pit of her stomach give away. He had claimed to _know her_ – she laughed at the idea. "HA HA!" she said out loud as she flopped over on her side.

How could anyone know her? Her best friend didn't even know her. Her own mother was just barely an acquaintance. Her sisters were only in her life long enough to torment and belittle her with the reminders of how she'd never live up to their examples. Her father, the one man that she respected most in the entire world… well he had sent her two cards this year, a birthday one and a credit one.

No one knew her and that was the way she liked it. When people knew you they had power over you and when they had power over you, then they could just push you around as they pleased and damn it, Bonnie Rockwaller wasn't about to be pushed around by anyone. That just wasn't the Rockwaller way.

After all her mother had tried to push her father around and look how that ended up? She had pestered him constantly, begging him to stop working so much, to stay home on the weekends, to not stay at the office so late, to spend more time with the family…

It couldn't be allowed. Her father had explained the entire situation – her mother was holding him back and Daddy had a business to run and a family name to uphold. He had patted Bonnie on the head and told her that she'd understand when she was older.

Of course, Bonnie _did_ understand – and that was one of the reasons she hated her mom. She was a weak and simpering woman who had been lucky enough to be a Rockwaller once, even if by name only, and had thrown it all away because she wanted to follow the claptrap advice of day-time talk show hosts and over priced marriage counselors.

She was such a stupid woman and Bonnie didn't want to be anything like her.

"_Who cares if he said he loves me! WHO CARES?"_, Bonnie screamed in her mind.

"_Stupid loser – what gives him the right to say all that to me? What does he know about how hard I work? What does he know about me? He's wrong, totally wrong!_"

Bonnie reached over and turned off the light on her end table and then climbed under the covers. She looked out the window at the night sky and said to no one in particular…

"I am so _not_ a sweet girl!"

She turned over on her side away from the window and fidgeted for a few minutes, unable to fall asleep properly – the words of Ron Stoppable replaying in her mind.

"… _I'm always looking at you, always watching you and… I know how hard you work to always do your best … I know the truth. I know that … deep down inside you're a sweet, kind hearted girl."_

Bonnie snorted loudly into the air.

"_I love you._"

Bonnie sighed. This wasn't working – she was too wound up to get to sleep. She needed to relax, needed some sort of release. Reluctantly she made up her mind and reached under her covers…

Nestled deep in between the folds of her bed sheets was a secret that Bonnie had kept from everyone. She groped for it and finally felt her fingers make contact with its well-worn surface. She always felt a little embarrassed whenever she went to retrieve it, but she knew that sometimes when she was feeling very… well, _non-Bonnie-like_, it was the best way to calm her nerves. With expert dexterity she navigated the confines of her bed and with a slight thrill of excitement that she rarely allowed herself, she produced her most special and favorite toy that she had affectionately named "Mr. Happy".

Now dear reader let me be the first to say to you – Get your mind out of the gutter!

"Mr. Happy", it turns out, was an ancient and dilapidated stuffed brown bear that her father had given her on her fifth birthday who had been given his appellation by the young girl both because of the subtle smile on his face as well as because her parents were getting a divorce and Bonnie had desperately needed someone around her who was happy. His fur, once luxurious and soft, had been mostly rubbed away by over a decade of cuddling. His button nose had fallen off long ago when Bonnie was 12, only to be replaced haphazardly by a dot crafted by permanent magic-marker. His eyes still stubbornly clung to his skull, but Bonnie always took extra care to avoid disturbing them too much so that she wouldn't have to go through the embarrassment of having to perform emergency repairs on an old friend she should have thrown away years ago.

Bonnie sighed again, this time however it was one of contentment. With Mr. Happy firmly snuggled in her arms she laid back down on her pillow and drifted off to sleep, her ursine familiar helping her ward off the uncomfortable questions that plagued her in the night.

Yes, Bonnie Rockwaller was most definitely _not_ a sweet and kindhearted girl.

-

"Oh my God Ron! Are you ok?" asked Kim Possible.

Ron, to his credit, was dimly aware that he shouldn't be holding his genitals in front of a dozen teenage girls – at least not without a good lawyer, so he made a valiant attempt to prop himself up against the wall in a sitting position.

"Uh… I think I'm ok KP," Ron said weakly.

Kim looked at Ron dubiously and spoke, "Are you sure Ron? I mean it looks like Bonnie really whacked your…"

"Pride!" interjected Tara, shooting a dirty look at Kim.

"I'm fine KP, I just fell down!" Ron protested – secretly grateful for Tara's intervention.

"Ron," Kim began, "There's no way you could possibly fall down on your…"

"Self!" exclaimed Tara, then realizing it didn't make much sense she added, "In the closet. It's so… small."

Ron looked slightly offended.

"Hey, it's not _that_ small!" he exclaimed.

Tara cringed away from Ron, looking extremely apologetic.

"What are you talking about Ron?" asked Kim, really confused about where the conversation had gone off too.

"Uh… the size of the closet?" Ron offered.

Kim just shrugged. "I've seen bigger."

At this pronouncement Ron's eyes got as big as saucers.

"Oh really? Whose closet KP? Maybe… ERICS?" spat Ron.

At this both Kim and Tara gave Ron _the look_. The one a teenage girl reserved for things like their parents singing along to soft rock radio and old men wearing Speedos at the beach. The one that basically said, "_Have you lost your mind?_"

"Well, now that you mention it Ron," said Kim, "Eric _does_ have a rather large closet. What's that got to do with anything?"

"Kimberly Ann Possible!" barked Ron, "What would your mother think!"

"Wow Kim, I had no idea you and Eric were that close…" ventured Tara, slightly bewildered.

"Huh? Look, I don't have time for this Ron – I'm supposed to meet Eric for the late movie tonight. He got pre-screening passes for Bricks of Fury XIV: The Brickening" responded Kim, quietly ignoring Tara.

"Kim!" shouted Ron, "You promised you'd go see that with me!"

Kim looked a little sheepish, but held her ground. "We can still see it together Ron… I'm sure I'll like it enough to see it twice."

"Oh, I see how it is" said Ron, "I get your sloppy brick seconds!" He was obviously getting upset now.

"I like bricks…" Tara ventured lamely, but was ignored by both Kim and Ron.

"I'm sorry Ron, but you're just going to have to deal," said Kim, "I'm leaving."

"Fine!" said Ron, "I'm leaving too!"

Kim just rolled her eyes.

"And one other thing!" said Ron.

"Yes?" replied Kim.

"Can you give me a ride home? I walked here."

Kim's eyes narrowed and for a split second she looked like she was going to shoot laser-hot beams of destruction right through the center of Ron's forehead.

"Oh… Whatever! C'mon Ron!" she said as she turned around on her heel to make for the door.

Ron slowly got up with some assistance from Tara.

"Um Ron," she started, "I'm really sorry about the closet, are you sure you want to go?"

Ron looked at her bravely, holding her hand in both of his.

"Tara – I need to do this. Thanks for your support, I appreciate it," he responded and then scurried after Kim.

There was utter silence in the living room after Tara heard the front door slam, announcing the departure of Ron and Kim. She looked nervously around the room at the few remaining partygoers and then shrugged her shoulders.

"Heh… I guess that was weird huh?" she said softly to the assembled group.

It probably wasn't the most brilliant thing to say, but it seemed to do the trick because a light conversation was started up again and someone had turned on the radio. Tara was a little disappointed at the way the night had turned out, especially when she had started it with such high hopes, but she wasn't the type of person to get too down after a minor setback or two. Still, she wondered….

Then all of a sudden it hit her.

"Wait, where they talking about – "

-

"Bonnie, we need to talk."

Bonnie slightly flinched away from the telephone receiver when Tara had uttered these words to her.

"Look T, about last night… I'm really sorry about – " Bonnie found herself cut off by a nearly hysteric Tara.

"Did Ron try to kiss you? Did he really?" she asked with obvious alarm.

Bonnie stared at the phone for a second in apprehension.

"_Wait a minute, don't tell me Tara's crushing on him… again!_"

Bonnie wanted to slam her head against the wall in frustration. She had spent a long time, literally months, convincing Tara _not_ to go out with Ron Stoppable. He was just… well a _loser_, bottom of the food chain type material, and while Tara wasn't quite at the top she was comfortable near the upper middle. Dating Ron Stoppable would completely change that – he would be the huge white elephant around her neck that would drive her into the basement of popularity. And of course if Tara went that far down the food chain…

Well, then, Bonnie wouldn't be able to be her friend any more. It was a prospect that Bonnie didn't want to think about. After all, Tara was pretty much all she had…

Still, what good would come of it if Bonnie told her the truth? It was an agonizing decision.

"Well, I don't know… I think so," Bonnie lied.

"So… maybe he didn't?" asked Tara, a slight bit of hopefulness creeping into her voice.

"What's this all about T? I thought you were going to go out with Josh." Bonnie prodded.

There was a slight pause on the other end of the phone line.

"Bonnie…" Tara whispered in a hushed voice.

"I don't think… well, I don't think Josh really likes me." Tara said.

Bonnie wrinkled her nose.

"Didn't he ask you to the prom?" Bonnie offered.

"Well, yes. But… I don' t know why he did that." Tara responded.

"What do you mean T?" asked Bonnie, hoping against hope that she wasn't about to hear what she thought she would.

"Bonnie…" Tara's voice sunk down to a low conspiratorial tone, "I don't think Josh likes girls."

"_Shit!_" thought Bonnie. She loved Tara, but the girl just wasn't supposed to be that smart! Bonnie had spent a lot of time leaning on that fruit Mankey just so that Tara would have someone sufficiently popular and _safe_ to go out with. It wasn't that Bonnie was trying to be mean to her best friend, it was just that Tara was… well, Tara. She was sweet, innocent, and _extremely_ gullible. Setting her up with a gay guy was pretty much the only way Bonnie could guarantee that her best friend wouldn't end up in the back seat of some meatheads car with her ankles above her head. It might have been arrogant of Bonnie to be making decisions like that for Tara, but she knew deep down inside that if someone didn't watch out for her, men were just going to use her and throw her away.

Somewhere in the back of her mind she thought, "_Just like Daddy did Mother._"

This entire aside, or possibly because of it, Bonnie was reluctant to let the issue go.

"Tara… are you saying that Josh is _gay_?" Bonnie asked with mock surprise.

Tara being Tara, didn't really want to come out and say something like that – especially since she didn't have any real, concrete proof, so she made a half hearted attempt at justifying her feelings.

"I… I don't know I guess. I just… well, there is this other guy I kind of like and…"

Tara sighed. She already knew what Bonnie was going to say, but there was just no way around it. Bonnie was her best friend and she had to tell _someone_.

"Don't say it T." Bonnie warned.

"But Bonnie…" Tara whined.

Bonnie audibly sighed through the phone for Tara's benefit and then began her diatribe.

"I thought we talked about this already T. He's a loser. He's at the bottom of the food chain. He's not good enough to even hang out with you let alone date. Everyone is going to make fun of you guys and it probably wont even work out and then what are you going to be left with?"

The phone was silent for a few seconds, then softly Tara's voice came over the line.

"Bonnie… you're my friend right?" asked Tara.

Bonnie didn't like where this was going.

"Yeah, of course T! Best friends" responded Bonnie.

"That's right, Best friends…" Tara paused for a second and then continued, "I love you Bonnie. You love me right? We're closer than sisters, right?"

Bonnie could feel her guts wrenching up inside her like an iron knot being twisted around her spine.

"_Don't do this Tara, please don't do this…_" she pleaded in her thoughts.

"Yes Tara…" Bonnie said in a weak voice.

"Bonnie… I need your help," Tara stated.

"_No, no, no, no, no…_"

"I think… I think I'm in love with Ron Stoppable."

"Shit!" said Bonnie out loud.

"Huh? What? Bonnie?" asked Tara, obviously disturbed.

"I uh… spilled some coffee on my lap. Oh shit that hurts. Ow." Bonnie quickly tried to smooth over her slip of the tongue.

This was no good, no good at all. Ron was at the absolute bottom of the food chain – if Tara went out with him then it would mean that there would be almost no way that they could be seen in public together any more. What the hell was she thinking?

"T… are you serious? Do you really… you know…" Bonnie didn't want to say it.

"I think so Bonnie. I don't think I've ever stopped thinking about him…" Tara had that dreamy quality in her voice that Bonnie had learned to dread.

"_I can't believe she's doing this… we've been best friends for years and now she's going to pick Stoppable over me?_"

Bonnie was, for lack of a better term, freaking out. She wasn't about to lose the only person in her life that she could confide in just because of that _loser_. She had to do something, and fast!

"Well, ok then Tara – I'll support you." Bonnie said.

"Really?" squealed Tara with barely contained glee.

"You're my best friend Tara and I love you and… I'll support you in this. I'll do whatever I can…"

"_To keep you with me and away from that loser…_"

"Thanks Bonnie!" Tara exclaimed, "You're the best!"

Tara then launched into an overly enthusiastic tirade about how she was going to go about trying to see if Ron was interested in going out with her. Bonnie for her part made a lot of "Mmm Hmm's" and various other non-committal sounds while Tara was talking just so the other girl wouldn't catch on. Tara was amazingly good at reading people sometimes, and Bonnie didn't want her to recognize that the cunning and diabolical machinery in her mind had started to churn.

Ron Stoppable had confessed to her, hadn't he?

Tara thought she was in love with Ron.

Bonnie didn't want them to go out.

The solution was obvious – a way for Bonnie to get back at Ron for the embarrassment and keep her best friend as well and maybe, just maybe, even take a sideways swipe at Kim. It seemed almost too good to be true.

All she had to do was give Stoppable a little encouragement, make him think that she was willing to return his affections - and then wait for Tara to confess to him. Once she did, and once he turned her down, Bonnie could go back to giving him the cold shoulder and not have to worry about her best friend tumbling off the food chain and out of her life.

It was a diabolical plan, yet elegantly simple as well – in essence, completely worthy of the Rockwaller name. And to top it all off, Bonnie would finally be able to prove a point –

She wasn't a sweet girl _after_ _all_.

-

Three thousand miles away an anxious young woman was just about to complete the final leg of a trans-continental flight from Japan to the United States. She was weary from lack of sleep, yet energized from what was about to happen. For what must have the one-hundredth time, she reached into her small purse and removed a carefully folded official document. With great reverence she opened it and placed it in her lap, her graceful fingers barely brushing the surface of the paper as she read it.

It had taken nearly all her resources as well as a great deal of time and even some rather unofficial "favors" to procure this document, but she was quite happy with the results. It was, after all, completely legal and registered with all the proper authorities. Great care had been taken to make sure that this was the case.

She was sure there would be some initial resistance, in fact she expected down right disbelief, but she was prepared for this. She was confident, not only in the righteousness of her mission, but also in her ability to see it through. She would do whatever it took to make sure that the Yamanouchi School continued; even if it meant doing some otherwise deceitful things to someone she secretly loved.

And yes, she was _definitely_ in love. She had been from almost the moment she had first laid eyes upon him. It was almost as if fate had grabbed her by the scruff of her neck and forced her to notice this man. There was no other rational way to explain it.

She smiled a soft, gentle smile to herself and then oh so carefully folded her document back up into a proper square, placing it gently within the inner pocket of her purse. In just a few more hours she would be in his home town, a place that she had always wanted to visit ever since he had first regaled her with his funny American stories and after that, hopefully, they'd be spending their first night together under the same roof.

Her body got all warm and flushed just thinking about it!

Fate, it seemed, had been kind to her. She had often been worried in the past that when it came time to train a new successor for the school, she would be forced to marry a man that she did not know and could not love. Her grandfather had often told her not to worry about these things – to let Kami-sama take care of her destiny, yet still she had concerns.

However, it seemed that her grandfather had been right all along. She looked at her watch and then gently uttered out a schoolgirls' giggle. It was all going to happen so soon.

Somewhere in Middleton Colorado, Yori Matsumaru was going to meet her destiny.

"_Danna-sama, your lovely young wife is coming for you!_"

-

A/N:

Wow, I can't believe I got out another chapter so quickly on the heels of the last one. I'm making a conscious effort to keep this story and it's chapters a little smaller than my last effort, but only because I want to finish this one sometime before next year!

Does anyone else think that Ron's life is about to get more complicated than he could ever imagine?

And what do people think of Bonnie? She's obviously… well, still Bonnie-like, but are people starting to fall in love with her yet? Don't worry, I'll keep working at it until you do! (Or I'm not accomplishing my goal!)

Amazingly enough I actually have the final paragraph of this story already written down. Now I just have to go and find the missing 85 percent and type it up. Please bear with me until I do!

Thanks,

QC


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3 – Operation: Lovely Wife – Part 1

-

Kim Possible studied the non-descript suburban Colorado home from the driver's seat of her car. She had driven over here on an impulse, having been overcome with a severe bout of guilt about the events that had transpired the night before. Since arriving however she had only been capable of staring at the home and contemplating what she was going to say to the occupants within.

"_I don't know what's up with Ron. He's been such a jerk lately – couldn't he see that I was just worried about him?_"

Kim had a sour look on her face as she remembered the events that had transpired at Tara's party. It wasn't _her fault_ that things had turned out like they did. In fact, she had actually been trying to do Ron a favor. Sure, if Ron had a girl friend type person in his life, it _would_ leave more time in Kim's schedule open so that she could spend time with Eric, but really – she just wanted her best friend forever to experience the joy of love as she had come to know it.

At least, that was her story and she was sticking to it.

When she had woken up this morning she had reluctantly admitted that perhaps she was a little bit too hard on Ron last night considering the circumstances and she had decided that the best thing to do would be just to pay him a visit and try to smooth everything over. It wouldn't be too hard, she mused – Ron was a sucker for her patented "Puppy Dog Pout" and if that didn't work she felt sure an early brunch of Bueno Nacho would set the two of them well on the path towards reconciliation.

With the situation made up in her mind, Kim stepped out of her car and started to make her way to the house. She was just about to head up the path to the front door when from her right she saw a long black car with tinted windows pull up to the curb of the Stoppable residence.

"_Huh? Who's that?_" she thought.

Kim absently pressed the ringer on the front door to Casa Del Stoppable while still staring at the now parked vehicle. No driver had yet emerged and the windows were so dark Kim couldn't make out who was in side. She was wondering if she should call Wade and get him to run the plates when the door to the house opened.

"Kim," said Ron Stoppable in as blank and emotionless tone as he could manage.

"Hey Ron!" Kim said with her best cheery voice. She was probably laying it on a little thick, but Ron could be kind of stubborn sometimes so she figured it was best to start off with both barrels blazing.

Ron stared at Kim for a second – you could tell he was trying to make up his mind about something. Whatever it was though, he wouldn't let on.

"So what's up Kim? Come to lock me in another dark closet? Third time's a charm?" he asked.

"Rooooon…." Kim began, "I'm really sorry about that – it was an accident! Bonnie wasn't supposed to be in there, I swear!"

Ron crossed his arms and looked down his nose at Kim's forehead. He had known her almost his entire life so he knew right away that she wasn't lying, but his pride, and most importantly, his _manhood_ had been injured. He was going to do her best to make her sweat a little bit.

"Yeah well you didn't seem really sorry when you went off and left me for Eric!" he whined at her.

"Ron! You came with us! I gave you a ride home after the movie!" Kim protested. This wasn't going as well as she had hoped. She was already started to get exasperated with Ron and if things kept going like this she knew that their friendship would be in serious jeopardy.

Ron paused for a moment and then leaned over, looking Kim square in the eye.

"Touché Miss Possible. Touché."

Kim sighed. This was absolutely _so Ron_. Did he just enjoy making things difficult for her?

"Look Ron, I just wanted to apologize about last night. Nothing went how I had planned it. I know I was mad because we started fighting, but after I got home last night…"

Ron's ears perked up a little bit.

"Well, I felt really bad – and I wanted to make it up to you" Kim finished.

Externally, Ron was the picture of restraint. Internally however… his heart soared and he was full of expectations. "_Yes!_" he thought to himself in victory, "_This is it!_"

"Bueno Nacho?" Ron asked hopefully.

"Bueno Nacho Ron. Two for one Macho Naco Combos." Kim nodded sagely.

"_The Ron-man shoots and he scores!_" he thought to him self. Ron Stoppable, as lovelorn as he had been, was still a man with needs. Spicy Mexican needs.

"Well, c'mon inside Kim, I need to put on some clean clothes" he said as he turned to walk up the stairs to his bedroom.

"Oh and Kim?" he asked.

"Yeah?"

"Who the heck is that in the limo out there?"

-

"Just wait!" Yori said as she bit her lip.

"Are you sure Miss? It's been a long trip, shouldn't you go inside?" asked the driver, a kindly older man who was dressed in a natty suit with a short brimmed dark cap.

Yori nodded to the man and then nearly pressed her face to the window.

"_What are they doing? What are they saying? I wish I could read American lips…She's going inside now… and Ron-san's parents aren't home!_"

Yori gnashed her teeth as she saw the door close. There had been a mix-up at the airport and her flight from Los Angeles to Colorado had been delayed. Because of this, she hadn't been able to arrive last evening when the entire Stoppable family would have been present. She knew that she should have waited to come here today, at least until Ron's parents had returned from work, but she was so anxious to start her mission that she decided to show up unannounced anyway. Plus, she had reasoned, there might be the possibility of some "alone-time" with Ron-san.

At the time the thought had made her blood boil hot. Now, it was boiling for another reason – a particular redhead who had just entered the home of her _Danna-sama_ while neither of their parents were present.

"_I knew that woman was going to be a problem! I knew it!_"

Yori reached into her bag and pulled out an overlarge manila envelope. She opened the flap and rummage around inside until she procured a packet of documents that were clearly labeled in English – Kim Possible. When Yori had first learned of her mission she had asked for the school to provide intelligence gathering on various people that surrounded her target in the interest of "learning the background of Ron-san". The truth was however that there was only _one_ person that she was interested in, and that person was the most dangerous one of all.

"_You will not seduce my Ron-san away from me with your pointy little breasts you redheaded tramp!_"

Yori flipped over the dossier and looked at the contents. The entire life of Kim Possible, world saving teen hero, and erstwhile best friend of Ron Stoppable, was there for her to read. There were family histories, relationship charts, academic reports, psychology profiles, and personal information. The personal information was what Yori was most interested in.

"_It says right here she is supposed to have a boyfriend! They aren't on a mission, they're not at school, why is she here so early in the morning?_"

Suddenly the voice from the driver interrupted Yori's internal ranting.

"Miss? What do you want me to do? Technically the ride's over and I don't get paid to idle the car here…" he sounded regretful to have to point out something so tacky considering how it was obvious this young woman was in emotional distress, but he liked his job and didn't want to get in trouble with his boss.

Yori thought about it for a moment. Kim was obviously going to be a problem. She obviously needed to keep an eye on her….

"_That's it! I have the perfect solution!_"

"One second!" Yori chirped as she dug through the dossiers again. Within the pile was the personal information and address of one individual in particular that Yori was going to need to get on her side if she was going to make her new plan work. It was an unfortunate development, but one she was sure she could handle – at least if the rest of the operation was still in place.

"_Ah ha! Here it is!_"

She quickly opened up the packet and looked for the relevant information. Then she leaned forward and spoke directly to the driver.

"Here – take me here!" she said, waving a page from the report in the man's face.

"Take me to the home of Steve Barkin!"

-

Gene Stoppable let out a low whistle as he inspected his new corner office at the Tri-City Insurance Company. To say it was posh, would be an understatement. The walls were freshly painted with the furthest two having large glass windows that let in copious amounts of fresh, healthy sunlight. As he sat behind his new oak executives desk, he took off his battered shoes and felt the rich plush carpet poke up between the holes in his socks and tickle his toes.

He couldn't believe his luck! Him, Gene Stoppable, mid-level actuary and tireless worker-bee had finally been recognized for his devotion to detail and excellent work ethic. He had almost resigned himself to finishing out his career with the same cubicle, the same ratty suit and the same terrible salary, when all of a sudden he had been lifted out of the pits of despair and placed here in these Elysium heights. Gene Stoppable, at the tender age of 55, had finally made Vice President. When he had first heard the news and had been escorted to his new office he had closed the door behind him and wept for 15 straight minutes.

He was just getting ready to start counting the zeros again in his new compensation package when all of a sudden the large executive-style phone on his desk started to buzz. He fumbled for a moment, knocking over his bronze Actuary of the Year award (circa 1989) and jabbed a chubby finger at the button.

"Uh… Yes?" he said, still unsure of his position.

"Mr. Stoppable, the home office called to say that you have a 10 o'clock meeting with the regional manager. You'll be meeting in the board room with Mr. Nakamura and Mr. Rockwaller," came the nasally reply of his new secretary.

"Oh, fine. Thank you!" he said and pressed the button again.

"_The regional manager! The company president!_"

Gene sat back in his plush leather chair and brought his fingers up to his neck to take his pulse. The last thing he wanted to do was die of excitement on the day that his families ship had finally come in. He couldn't wait to rush home and tell his wife and son – just the image of them leaping into his arms and hailing him as the conquering hero put a huge smile on his face. With the amount of money that had come along with his new position, not to mention the bonus he had just received, he could finally buy his son that car he wanted and Meryl, his sweet Meryl, could finally quit that second job.

Yes, things were definitely looking up for the Stoppables.

But first, he had a meeting to make. 10 o'clock wasn't that far away so Gene made his way out the door of his office, waved goodbye to his new secretary Grace (who happened to be quite attractive – he'd have to make sure not to mention her to Meryl) and then walked directly across the hall to _it._ The one place that he had always wanted to go to, but until now, could not – the executive elevator.

Gene placed his ID badge over the electronic sensor and stood back as the shiny gilt metal doors slid open, releasing a subtle wave of pressurized air into the office hall. He entered, almost apprehensively, then inhaled deeply. This was it, what he'd been after his entire life – the smell of respect. The elevator made a slight humming noise as it ascended into the heavens, carrying Gene Stoppable away from the dross and morass of his old life and delivering him to the highest heights a simple actuary like him could ever have hoped for. Eventually the elevator slowed down, coming to a halt at the top floor and the doors slid open.

Standing there, with a hand held out to greet him, was the man Gene had often admired, but never approached – Richard Rockwaller.

"Mr. Rockwaller!" he exclaimed, while offering his hand.

Richard Rockwaller smiled a toothy grin at Gene. While the elder Stoppable showed the full effects of his world-weary 55 years, Richard, who was exactly the same age, looked like a man in the prime of his life. His skin was smooth and tanned, his teeth bristling white, his hair elegantly coifed and the entire package was wrapped in an impeccable Armani suit. Gene suddenly felt very self-conscious.

"Please Gene, call me Richard!" he said with an obviously false friendliness.

Richard Rockwaller knew this man. In fact, he had gone to school with him when they were both children, but he had never thought that the home office would select someone like _him_ to head up their actuary department. The entire concept was mind-boggling and Richard wondered just what those crazy Jap's had been thinking. In fact, he had protested long and loud about having this dull and listless man hoisted upon the management of what he considered to be _his_ office, but all of his complaints had fallen on deaf ears. Someone it seemed was dead set on having Gene Stoppable run the business that Richard Rockwaller had built up straight into the ground.

He was determined to find out whom, and then force them to send Gene back to the pits of loser-dom where he belonged.

"So Gene, how have you been? I think we haven't seen each other since… what was it? High School, right?" Richard asked with obvious smarm in his voice.

"Uh… actually… uh Richard," Gene was obviously uncomfortable addressing him in such a familiar manner, "it was at the 30 year reunion a few years back."

Richard looked genuinely shocked.

"Really? You don't say?" he asked as he lead Gene towards the board room.

"Yes… I was there with my wife Meryl."

"You're married Gene?" asked Richard with a tone of surprise in his voice.

"Twenty five years. We have a son, he goes to High School with your daughter." Gene replied.

Richard's head flipped back for a second.

"_Wait, they have a son that goes to school with Bon-Bon? Maybe she could 'pump' the boy for a little information on behalf of her old man. Figure out how this loser got promoted so high, so fast._"

Richard Rockwaller filed that thought away in his mind for later usage. He _really_ hated feeling like he wasn't in control and he wasn't above using his daughter to help him re-establish command of the situation.

"Well, here we are!" he exclaimed, pushing Gene by the back through the large double doors to the executive boardroom.

The room was empty, except for one diminutive elderly Japanese man – it was easy to tell who Mr. Nakamura was.

"M-m-mr. Nakamura!" Gene exclaimed, falling into a stiff bow to the older man. Gene truthfully didn't know much about the Japanese businessmen who had bought out the Tri-City Insurance company during the 80's, but he did watch movies so he knew that bowing was probably the right thing to do.

The elderly man rose from his seat and elegantly returned the bow.

"Please Mr. Stoppable, call me Kenji." He replied.

Gene straightened up and responded, "Well then, please call me Gene."

Mr. Nakamura smiled at this and motioned for Gene to sit.

"Now Kenji…" began Richard Rockwaller.

"Mr. Nakamura," came the short response from the wizened man. Richard Rockwaller visibly blanched at the rebuke.

"O-o-of course sir!" he said quickly.

Gene Stoppable shifted nervously in his chair. He wasn't sure what kind of game Nakamura was trying to play, but he was sharp enough to understand that the elder Japanese man had just earned him the loathing of Richard Rockwaller.

"_Please God, don't let me be out on my ass here after a week"_, he silently prayed.

"Gene," the inscrutable man began, "I want to congratulate you and on behalf of our home office extend our warmest regards to you and your family."

Gene smiled and nodded. The old man at least appeared sincere.

At this Kenji Nakamura reached into his suit pocket and retrieved a small envelope. He then slid it across the table to Gene who raised his eyebrows in question.

"That, Gene Stoppable, is your new benefits package. Please look inside.", Mr. Nakamura said.

Gene slid his thumb under a loose flap of the envelope and gently tore it open. There was a multi-page document inside that he removed and began to study.

"Take your time Gene and read it all.", Nakamura urged.

Gene nodded and continued to study the pages. It was somewhere around the third or fourth paragraph that his eyes suddenly got as big as dinner plates.

"_This is… incredible! We'll be set for life!_" it took all of Gene's self control not to start hyperventilating on the spot. He cleared his throat with a nervous cough and then spoke, "Ahem, this is… quite good. Excellent really. Thank you very much sir."

"Kenji, Gene. And I'm glad it meets your approval. If there is anything you would like to change; say – more paid vacation, or less working hours, please let me know and I'll do my best to move it along."

This was really getting to be too much for Gene, he had to know. He absolutely _had to know_. What, if anything, had he done to deserve so much? He had always taken pride in his work and he felt confident that he had always done the best job he could possibly do, but there was no way on Earth he could have ever imagined something like this could happen – not to him anyway! It wasn't that Gene had thought of himself as a _loser_ per-see, but he did know one thing for sure, Gene Stoppable _wasn't_ one of the elite – that was Richard Rockwaller whom was sitting across from him and looking increasingly perplexed.

"Um… Kenji…" Gene began in a nervous voice, "I… I have to know something. How, er… Why? Why did all this happen?"

There, he had said it. He knew it wasn't the smoothest thing he could have possibly said, especially since any public doubt of his right to such largess would most likely prove to the two men in the room with him that he didn't deserve it, but there was just no way Gene would ever be able to get a wink of sleep if he didn't know _why_ this was happening.

Kenji Nakamura looked at Gene Stoppable straight in the eye. Without breaking contact he then said, "Rockwaller-san, please leave the room."

Richard Rockwaller was obviously not happy about this. It was all he could do not to make an annoyed "huffing" noise as he stood up and exited the grand chamber. When the door finally closed, and rather loudly it should be noted, Nakamura broke into a broad smile.

"Gene, let me be the first to welcome you to the family.", he said.

Gene nodded and said, "Thank you… I know that everyone here at Tri-City Insurance is supposed to be a family."

Nakamura laughed at this.

"No, no Gene. That's not what I meant. I mean _the family_.", he said with a light chuckle.

Nakamura studied Gene Stoppable. Obviously the man wasn't getting what he was trying to say. It was so typical of Americans, you had to be extremely blunt with them or else they just refused to understand. A more direct approach was definitely in order so Kenji leaned forward and reached out his hand to Gene, who took it and shook hard.

"Gene, welcome to the Yamanouchi Group."

-

Kim Possible looked in horror at the carnage before her. It was brutal, it was gory, it was quite likely the most disturbing thing she had ever seen in her life.

It was Ron Stoppable going to town on 2 for 1 Naco Day at Bueno Nacho.

"_How can he do that? I haven't even touched my food and I'm already feeling sick._"

"Hey KP?" asked Ron in between disturbingly loud crunches, "So like, if Bon-Bon wasn't supposed to be in that closet… who was?"

Kim just stared blankly at Ron.

"KP?" he asked, "Helloooooooo, Earth to Kim Possible!"

"Huh? What? Oh… Sorry Ron.", Kim said, finally free from the near hypnotic grotesquerie that was Ron's table manners.

"I _said_ - Who was supposed to be in that closet?"

Ron had spent a long time thinking about it and while he wasn't in danger of being called a genius any time soon, he had been able to determine from the way Kim acted that it had probably _not been her_ who was his mystery lover. It sort of annoyed him at the time, and while Ron was still pretty dead set on declaring his immutable and everlasting love for his best friend, he still wanted to know which girl was his secret crush. He felt like it was his right to know.

"Oh, _interested_ are you?" teased Kim as she crouched low in her chair and gave Ron a devilish grin.

Ron paused from his consumption enough to actually set down his Naco and put on his serious face.

"Not that it matters to me," he said gruffly, hoping Kim would get the hint.

"Are you _sure_ Ron? What if she's really cute?" Kim said in a low voice.

The left side of Ron's face ticked up, scrunching his eye and curling his lip. He wanted to say something like, "_No girl is cuter than you Kim!_" or "_It doesn't matter what she looks like, you're the most beautiful woman in the world to me!_" or even, "_Kim! I love you!_" but for some reason the words just wouldn't come out of his mouth. Instead all he managed was a weak, "I don't know…" and then he proceeded to stare at the half eaten Naco that he had laid to rest on his tray.

Kim noticed that something that she had said had really brought Ron down into an emotional funk and she wondered what she could do to cheer him up again. Even though she wasn't completely sure that it would work out, Kim _wanted_ to tell him about Tara, but something held her back. The words just wouldn't come out of her mouth. Instead all she managed was a weak, "It's ok Ron…"

The two of them sat there in silence, wondering what the hell was wrong with them until all of a sudden the awk-wierdness was broken by the derisive dulcet tones of one Ms. Bonnie Rockwaller.

"Why, if it isn't the _loser_ brigade."

"Stow it Bon-Bon," said Ron in an uncharacteristic display of backbone.

"Hmph!" said Bonnie, "Don't think you can talk to me like that after what you did to me Stoppable!"

"Bonnie, leave Ron alone it was an –" Kim began, but she was cut off by Ron.

"Look Bonnie, I'm sorry ok? If it makes you feel better I take it all back."

Bonnie looked at Ron squarely in the eye.

"What do you mean take it all back?" she practically screamed at him. For some reason when Bonnie had heard those words from Ron, she felt a little stab of pain deep down inside her chest.

"What do you think he means by – " Kim started to say.

"Quiet K, this is between me and the loser." Bonnie barked back.

Kim stood up, her face was getting red and her hands were clenched at her side.

"Bonnie! You can't just – " Kim started _again_, only this time to be cut off by Ron.

"Kim, it's ok. Bonnie's right – this is between me and her." Ron said with a resigned tone.

"So Stoppable," said Bonnie, "What do you intend to do about this?"

Ron had shot off his mouth to Kim about taking responsibility, but right now he was feeling pretty trapped. He needed to apologize to Bonnie - Things were always tenuous between them and if Ron didn't resolve the sitch then there was no telling what Bonnie would do to get back at him… and Kim. Still, Ron felt pretty certain that he didn't want Kim to know the _entire_ details of what had happened in that closet – asides from the fact that it was embarrassing as hell, there was also the fact was that Kim had tried to set him up with some other girl and he didn't want to make it look like he was so desperate as to accept whatever scraps Kim would throw at him. Especially not when Kim was the one that he _really_ wanted.

"KP, can you excuse me and Bonnie. I think it's time we settled this like adults." Ron said in his most serious voice.

Kim was still pissed, livid actually, but deep down inside she was proud of Ron. She knew that he didn't like dealing with Bonnie and while she didn't know exactly what had happened inside that closet she admired the fact that Ron was going out of his way to make it up to Bonnie like a gentleman.

"Ok Ron, I'll just go to the restroom."

Kim shot Bonnie a dark look and then retreated to the back of the restaurant. Bonnie watched her the entire way and when she was sure that Kim was gone she turned back to Ron.

"_Ok Rockwaller, as unpleasant as this may be remember the reason why you are doing this. Eyes on the prize._"

It was the truth. What Bonnie was about to do was a huge risk to her social standing and her future at Middleton High, and quite possibly even beyond, but she had no other choice. She loved her best friend Tara better than she loved her own sisters (which was easy to do since Connie and Lonnie Rockwaller were bona fide grade-a bitches) and she needed to protect her reputation.

No, there she was, lying again.

Bonnie had faced the cold hard facts last night when she was formulating this plan. The truth was, she wasn't doing this for Tara. If she were a friend, a good friend to Tara like she had been to Bonnie, she would have honestly supported Tara's feelings towards Ron. Tara was a sweet, naive, gullible young woman who would be chewed up and spit out by most of the self-serving men around her. A guy like Stoppable, no matter how much of a loser he was, would be safe for her. It was practically impossible for Bonnie to imagine doofy, dorky, Ron Stoppable ever being capable of breaking Tara's heart.

In the deep, dark hours of the middle of the night Bonnie Rockwaller had admitted something that she had never admitted before – she desperately needed Tara to be her friend and if Tara started dating Ron, then that just couldn't happen any more.

Bonnie had a job to do so she steeled her nerves, looked around to make sure no one else was watching and then sat down.

Next to Ron.

"Uh… Bonnie?" asked Ron with a squeak in voice.

"Shhh Ron, there's something I need to say to you." Bonnie said in a soft voice.

"_Ok, time to lay it on thick – Do it for Tara, Bonnie!_" she encouraged herself.

"Ron… what you said to me…"

Ron started to protest, to say he didn't mean it, to say that it was an accident, but he got distracted when Bonnie leaned a little closer to him.

"_Is that… a boob?_"

Ron's brain almost short-circuited as something soft and decidedly interesting brushed up against his arm.

"Well, I've been thinking and I'm sorry that I acted he way I did."

Ron wasn't really paying all that much attention to what Bonnie was saying. He looked briefly down to where she was making contact with his arm and then decided that he really didn't want Bonnie to catch him looking at that, so he looked right back up into her eyes, only find that her face was just inches from his own.

"Ulp!" he uttered.

"Ron, I just want you to know… you were right about me Ron, totally right."

Ron looked agog at Bonnie, his mind not comprehending what his ears were hearing.

"I was?" he asked incredulously.

"Yes Ron, you were right. Only you were able to see it Ron, only you." Bonnie whispered as she gazed into Ron's eyes.

"But Ron…" she said, in a despairing voice, "Please do me a favor Ron, please?"

To Ron it looked like Bonnie was practically on the verge of tears. He couldn't believe it – he had never seen Bonnie's face so emotive. Well, except for the times when she was relishing in a good put-down or grinning at her own superiority. Bonnie was actually surprisingly good at looking sad and hurt – if she wanted to she could definitely give Kim's patented "Puppy Dog Pout" a run for it's money.

"Uh… what Bonnie?" Ron asked in a daze, semi-enthralled by Bonnie's expression.

"Don't tell anyone Ron. Please don't tell anyone. I couldn't bear it for people to…" Bonnie grasped around for the right words that would protect her reputation while allowing her to manipulate Ron, "understand me like you do."

"You'll do that for me, won't you Ron?" she asked while reaching her hand up to his chin.

Ron nodded.

"Oh thank you Ron!" Bonnie gushed while gently caressing the side of Ron's cheek.

Ron went to say "No big" but for some reason it came out more like, "Uhhh…"

"K's going to come back soon Ron, so I have to go." Bonnie put on a show of being disappointed. Ron couldn't help it but his face mimicked Bonnie's on it's own accord.

"Ron, let's meet tomorrow after school at the…" Bonnie wondered where she could go where no one who mattered would be able to see her, "library. The Middleton Public Library."

"_Did Bonnie just ask me out on a date?_ _I should find out… but what about Kim? KIM! Head in the game Stoppable, you love Kim not Bonnie!_"

Ron was just about to refuse Bonnie when she did the unexpected. With a quick peek around her shoulder to make sure someone wasn't looking, she leaned in towards Ron's face and pressed her lips against his.

Ron's brain blew a gasket. He knew he should pull away, or push Bonnie away, or otherwise get out of the situation but for some reason he found himself completely paralyzed. Then he realized why – it was the first time a girl had ever kissed him on the mouth under her own free will.

"_Wow… Wait! Is that… tongue?_"

It was.

Just as quickly as the kiss started, Bonnie pulled away and then got up from the booth. With a final look back at Ron, she opened the door and left, leaving the poor confused boy to his own thoughts.

"Hey Ron! Where'd Bonnie go?" It was Kim, evidently she had returned from the bathroom.

"Huh? Oh… she left." Ron said in a daze.

"Well, we should get going too. I told my parent's I'd clean my room today." Kim said.

She had been slightly worried about Ron. For all his intentions of taking responsibility, Bonnie Rockwaller wasn't someone to be dealt with lightly – thus she was glad when she came back to find Bonnie gone and Ron looking relatively intact and unharmed.

Ron nodded at Kim and then stood up from the booth and started to waddle to the trash can so he could throw away his used tray.

"Wow Ron, Bonnie must have gotten you good – I can see the swelling hasn't gone down yet." Kim remarked.

Ron took one look down, blushed a heavy shade of crimson and pronounced, "Oh yeah, she got me _really_ good."

-

A/N:

This chapter was originally intended to cover more plot but I cut it short because I couldn't jam it all into what I considered a tolerable sized update. Remember: I've just gotten done writing a 25,000 word final chapter for Ron Stoppable, Ultimate Monkey Master so I'm trying to keep things down to a much more manageable 5,000 words per offering.

First of all I want to say thank you for everyone who has reviewed my story so far. Generally speaking I get a terrible amount of reviews to page hits (about 1 review for every 300 hits it seems), but this story has been slightly better and I really appreciate it. I just want to put out there the idea that the reviews and PM's are the only rewards I get for writing and I absolutely love hearing what people think about my stories – not just if they are great or bad, but what they liked/disliked about them. It's the fuel that keeps the QC writing machine going.

Anyway, I think the story is coming a long nicely although I haven't had as much time to establish characters as I like (and I _do_ like to take my time, anyone who's read RSUMM can testify to that), but I'm still not done introducing characters and setting up the situation yet. Fear not dear readers, Yori will make her "public" debut next chapter, bringing with her a whole array of complications for the Ron-man.

I agonized a little bit over the Bueno Nacho scene because I wanted to make sure that it came across right. I think I did a good job, but I was very hard for me to write without it seeming trite. If people question Ron's response to Bonnie's flirting, I caution them to remember that Ron _is_ a young man and Bonnie, despite people's dislike of her personality, is smoking hot. You'd be hard pressed to find a young guy who _wouldn't_ start to get a little incoherent with a hot babe flirting with him.

I keep trying to cut the dick and fart jokes down, but I find myself relying on them all the time. I think this means either I am a comedic genius capable of making the crudest forms of humor seem urbane, or I am totally bereft of original ideas. I leave it up to you Dear Reader to decide.

Sorry for the ridiculously long author notes, next time I wont be quite so chatty.

Peace,

QC

PS: Yes, three updates in three days. I am way too good to you guys! hehehe


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4 – Operation: Lovely Wife – Part 2

-

Ron Stoppable carefully examined his reflection in the mirror. Normally he was pretty ambivalent about what he saw, so it wasn't an activity that he spent a great deal of time doing.

Normally, that is.

Today however, he was intrigued by the possibility that something had changed, or perhaps there had been something there that he had overlooked for the last sixteen years of his life. Perhaps somewhere on the slightly freckled surface of his face was an untapped goldmine of hotness that he had neglected to exploit. He didn't know exactly what it was, but something had _definitely_ changed.

It was the only explanation for what had happened in Bueno Nacho just a few scant hours before.

"She used tongue Rufus! Tongue!" Ron exclaimed to his faithful pet. Rufus for his part just looked at Ron in utter shock, going so far as to let precious scraps of cheese drop forlornly from his mouth.

"I know! I can't believe it either. Bonnie of all people, kissing me!" Ron said as he turned his face to examine his profile in the mirror.

"What do you think buddy? Do you think I somehow got hotter in the last couple of days?" Ron asked.

Rufus scampered over to the dresser and took a position directly in front of Ron. He squinted one of his little black eyes and put a paw under his chin so as to look deep in thought.

"Hnk?" Rufus said, with a shrug of his diminutive shoulders.

Ron still searched his reflection but he knew his faithful pet was correct. From the outside, it didn't seem like anything at all had changed about him. In fact, he had surreptitiously counted two new blemishes and a full-grown pimple starting to poke out from the side of his chin. The "hotness" theory was definitely not panning out.

Ron scooped up Rufus and carried him along while he flopped on his bed, placing the mole-rat just mere inches from his face.

"You know Rufus, I think I really messed up", he said dejectedly.

"Hnk?" Rufus responded, obviously not following Ron's train of thought.

"The closet Rufus! I made a huge mistake. When I was in there… well, I thought Kim was going to come in so I… kinda confessed my feelings for her." Ron said sadly.

Rufus chattered something that only Ron could understand.

"No, not Kim. Bonnie was inside the closet!" Ron said.

Rufus made a face at Ron that demonstratively showed what he thought of that.

"I know, but I didn't check first to see if it was Kim… it was a total mistake buddy! I swear!" Ron said.

Rufus scampered the short distance between him and Ron and put a tiny paw on the boys shoulder, patting him in a comforting gesture.

"What am I going to do Rufus? I mean, I know I should clear this all up with Bonnie, but you didn't see her today man. It was amazing! I've known Bonnie for years and I've never seen her so, so…" Ron struggled to find the right word.

"Happy. No, sweet… No, beautiful. All those things, it was incredible", he finally pronounced.

"Hnk!?" Rufus exclaimed.

"Yeah I know… You should have seen her man. There was this part where she was asking me to keep her secret and she had this look on here face like if I had told her 'no', that she would have just folded up on herself and cried." Ron shook his head sadly.

"Rufus, I've never, _ever_ had that kind of power over a woman in my entire life. The fact that it was Bonnie Rockwaller not only blows my mind, but it actually _scares_ me!"

Rufus, not being a master of human interpersonal relationships, wondered exactly what the hell Ron was talking about, but decided to let it slide. It was obvious Ron wasn't looking for answers so much as letting his problems out of his skull.

"There's only one thing to do Rufus. I still love Kim, so I'm going to have to let Bonnie down gently. But…" Ron's voice trailed off as he thought for a moment.

"But I'm going to try being her friend first", he stated.

"I think that's the right thing to do Rufus. I think what Bonnie needs right now is just a good friend."

Ron flipped back on his side and smiled. He was proud of himself for not letting the situation go to his head. He was proud of himself for staying devoted to Kim (even if she didn't really seem all that unhappy with Eric) and most importantly he was proud of himself for doing what he thought was the right thing. Him and Kim saved the world on countless occasions, but rarely had Ron Stoppable ever had the chance to make an impact on such a profoundly personal level.

It was with a great sense of self-satisfaction that Ron turned off the lights and went to bed that night. He slept the sleep of the righteous, completely confident in his decision and blissfully unaware that he had put into motion events that would turn his world upside down.

-

Bonnie Rockwaller unlocked the kitchen door to her home and slipped inside, taking special precautions to make sure no one was around. It wasn't that she was doing anything out of the ordinary, or anything that she shouldn't be doing; she just didn't want any of the other residents of the Rockwaller household to bother her. Bonnie had always felt that with the exception of her father, everyone else that was blood related to her merely existed to make her life hell. If it wasn't her older sisters belittling her and mocking her, then it was her mother trying to start a saccharine-sweet "heart to heart" talk with her. Connie and Lonnie were bad enough to deal with, not crying in front of their more brutal displays of intimidation was a Herculean task in its self, but having to sit through one of her mother's pathetic attempts at "bonding"… well Bonnie would rather skip both experiences all together.

Quickly Bonnie crept through the kitchen, entering the living room and practically gliding up the stairs. It wasn't until she had the door to her bedroom closed and locked behind her that she let her guard down. She hated feeling like she was living behind enemy lines, but it seemed that it was just the way things had to be – at least until she graduated and went to college. When she was younger she used to beg her mother to send her to live with her father, but her mom always blew her off with the same excuse, "_I'll ask him dear_". Without a doubt a few days later her mom would come back and tell Bonnie that it just "wouldn't be a good idea" and then she'd adamantly refuse to talk about it any more. To make matters worse every time she tried to broach the matter with her dad, he would always give Bonnie a really sad look and say, "_It's out of my hands sweetie, I can't do anything about it_" and then _he_ would refuse to talk about it as well.

It drove Bonnie so nuts that eventually she just stopped asking. She was pretty sure however, that the entire thing was probably her mothers fault.

"_She just wants to keep me here to make her feel better about herself._" Bonnie would think. Heaping blame upon her mother was something she was good at.

Bonnie sighed and kicked her shoes off into the corner. Today had been extremely unpleasant for her on many levels and she was just glad it was over.

"_Just a couple more days Bonnie and then you can put the axe in Stoppable and keep your best friend._"

She frowned a little bit when she thought this. The idea wasn't as comforting as it had sounded earlier.

Although she had pretty much talked her self into it, she really didn't like what she was about to do to Tara. The sweet little blonde girl had been Bonnie's one true friend since elementary school, back before Bonnie had become the "Queen B". Bonnie knew that because of this she owed Tara a debt of loyalty, but there was something more there as well.

"_T's always been there for me. She's always supported me, even when I was a down right bitch to her. I know people think I take that for granted but I don't._"

Bonnie paused for a moment.

"_Do I?_"

Maybe she did. It was hard not to look at it that way when she thought about what she was doing – essentially stealing the affections of a boy Tara liked and then dumping him, all so that Tara wouldn't get him. Just admitting it like that made Bonnie sick to her stomach.

"_What's wrong with me?_"

And then there was Stoppable himself. God he was such a _loser_. He was a nobody; not popular, not a jock, not particularly handsome, and to top it all off he wasn't even very smart. In pretty much every category that mattered he came up with big giant zeros.

"_What does she see in him anyway?_"

At first that question had completely baffled Bonnie, but then again that was before today and their brief encounter at Bueno Nacho. It had been strange – Bonnie had been playing Stoppable like a flute and he was so dumb that he had bought it hook, line and sinker. She should have had nothing but scorn for someone who had allowed them to be so easily manipulated, but for some reason instead of contempt all she felt right now was _tired_.

"_And the way he looked at me when I was playing Ms. Pouty-Princess… what a dork!_"

Bonnie had been laying it on thick at the time, begging, _pleading_ Ron to not let her "secret" out. The look he had given her had been priceless – the way his brow had furrowed and his big brown eyes had welled up with concern, it was almost like he was feeling _sorry_ for her.

"_Hmph! What right does a loser like that have to feel sorry for ME!_" she ranted.

Bonnie threw herself on her bed, her arms and legs reaching out, fingers and toes curled in frustration.

"_He's just a stupid loser. What does he know? I don't need pity! Especially not from someone so pathetic!"_

Bonnie hadn't realized it, but she was getting so worked up that she had grabbed on to the nearest available thing and was practically throttling it in her hands.

"_We'll see how sorry you are for me when I dump you on your ass you creep!_"

And with that Bonnie flung her arms out, sending something flying across the room and careening into her bookcase, knocking off a few knickknacks that had been balanced there.

"_Huh?_"

She rolled over towards that direction and looked to see what had happened. Then she spotted it, lying on the floor amongst a pile of bedroom detritus – her secret treasure, her bear.

Bonnie just stared at the poor, lonely remnant of her childhood.

"Sorry Mr. Happy", she whispered, not even noticing the tears that were starting to rim her eyes.

-

Kim Possible rubbed her bleary eyes and yawned loudly as she crossed the foyer of her home towards the front door. It was early, _really_ early, and while she had said "Be here early!" there were certainly limits to such phrases that normal, sensible people, tried to uphold. Unfortunately for Kim, Tara Strong didn't seem to be one of those people.

"Hey Kim!" the perky blonde chirped through the now open door.

"Hey Tara…" Kim muttered, "What time is it?"

Tara smiled sweetly at Kim and stated with all seriousness, "I don't know!"

Kim cocked an eyebrow at the girl. She had some inkling from their earlier conversation that Tara had been harboring a pretty big crush for Ron, but it seemed like something inside the petite blonde girl had snapped recently. When she had called Tara last night to invite her over this morning as part of her "plan" to get her and Ron together, what had started out as just a simple phone call had turned into a four hour marathon. It was pretty incomprehensible to Kim that a girl would ever feel this way about _Ron_, and to be blunt – it kind of freaked her out.

"Well, um… Come inside I guess." Kim said as she motioned for Tara to follow her inside.

"I didn't expect for you to show up so early, Mom's not up so no breakfast yet… do you want cereal or something?"

"No thanks Kim, I'd probably just throw up!" Tara said in a nervous twitter followed by a giggle.

"_Ok, this girl has gone of the deep end. I'm starting to get worried here, maybe this wasn't such a great idea. What if she goes psychotic on Ron? Sure she looks all sweet and innocent, but the way she is acting…She does realize it's just Ron Stoppable, right?_"

Kim studied Tara from across the kitchen table, wondering what exactly to make of the sitch. She decided she needed some information.

"So Tara…" she began, "I gotta know… why is it that you like Ron so much?"

Tara blinked at Kim, looking confused.

"Are you serious?" she asked.

"Totally. I want to know, so spill", responded Kim.

"Well… for starters, he's really sweet – he's probably the nicest boy in the whole school!"

Kim nodded.

"He's also very kind – I can tell he really cares about people."

Kim grunted in agreement.

"He really says what he means too, he's not fake at all."

Kim resisted the urge to snort at this. Ron was usually pretty good about being _Ron_, but sometimes… Well, let's just say he had on occasion let certain things go to his head and leave it at that.

"And…"

Kim looked intently at Tara, "And…"

Tara blushed. "He's kind of cute too."

Kim wasn't sure if it was the sleep deprivation or the shock of Tara's statement, but her hand slipped out from underneath her chin and she nearly fell forward on the table.

"Wait, we're talking about _Ron_, right?" Kim asked, completely baffled.

Tara continued to blush and merely nodded.

Kim pushed herself away from the table and leaned back, it was a strange habit of hers to rock backwards in chairs whenever she was thinking.

"_You know, there may be something to that 'psychotic' theory of mine. Remember what they say – it's always the quiet ones you have to worry about._"

"I'm kind of surprised Kim…" said Tara, finding her voice again.

Kim just raised her eyes.

"I mean, you and Ron have been friends for practically forever. I'm sure you know _all about_ what I just said."

Kim was slightly taken aback. It was somewhat true – her and Ron _had_ been friends for the vast majority of their young lives. They knew each other about as well as two people could.

"Yeah, I guess that's true Tara."

"_She does kind of have a point – maybe it's just because I never really looked at Ron that way… I wonder why not?_"

Kim was actually starting to put some serious thought into the reasons behind the fact that her closest friend on the planet, who happened to also be a male, as well as the most trustworthy, loyal and caring person she had ever met, had never really been in her mind what she would call "boyfriend material". If she had stayed at it for a few minutes longer she might have come to some realizations, but alas it wasn't meant to be.

"So Kim," interrupted Tara, "I want to thank you for thinking of this idea for me. It's perfect – I can get to spend some time with Ron and…"

"Bonnie won't see it so you don't have to worry about her freaking out on you." Kim finished.

"No actually, that's not what I was going to say. I talked to Bonnie the other day and…"

Kim hung on Tara's words for a second.

"She said she totally supports me! Isn't that awesome!" Tara practically beamed at Kim.

Kim was shocked; it wasn't the kind of reaction that she would have expected from Bonnie Rockwaller. In fact, it ran contrary to everything that she knew about the girl. But even if it was unexpected, Kim had to admit that if Bonnie wasn't actively attempting to keep Tara and Ron apart, it would be a heck of a lot easier to get them together.

She should have been happy at that fact, but for some reason she greeted it with a fair amount of indifference.

"Well that's great news. So, what were you going to say?"

"Oh right!" Tara seemed to switch gears, "I was going to say – get to know him better!"

"I mean, I think it would be great if Ron and I started going out right away, but I'm not so sure that's the best thing. My mom always told me that dad was her best friend and um…" Tara stopped talking for a moment. She hadn't meant to be so chatty, but all the excitement had gotten to her and she was worried at how Kim was going to take what she was going to say next.

"And?" Kim prodded her, more than a little interested.

Tara's voice got noticeably softer and she continued, "uh… I'd like to be Ron's best friend – too! You know, like his…" she was fumbling now and knew it, "other best friend!"

"That sounds great Tara." Kim said in an icy tone that surprised even her.

"_What? Why did that bug me so much? I mean, c'mon Eric is my… best… um… boyfriend._"

Kim liked Eric. He was handsome, smart, witty, polite, handsome, and… Well, anyway, she felt that they were pretty good friends. That was good enough right? Despite what Tara's mom had said, Kim felt pretty certain that best friends and boy friends were two separate animals.

"_What kind of sick-o wants to make out with their best friend anyway?_"

Suddenly from the far end of the room, the light switch went on bathing the kitchen in full illumination.

"I thought I heard voices down here," said Dr. Anne Possible.

"Oh, hi Mom… You know Tara." Kim said, nodding her head to her fellow cheerleader.

"Hello Tara, I don't mean to be rude – but what are you doing over here so early in the morning?" Kim's mother asked.

"We're going to school together today mom" Kim interceded before her mother could pull all the gorchy details of their plot from the innocent blonde girl.

"Kimmie, school doesn't start for another couple hours."

"Um… I invited Tara to breakfast!" Kim responded, shooting a look at Tara that the other girl interpreted as "_Let me handle this!_"

Mrs. Dr. P looked a little confused for a moment, something was gnawing at the corners of her brain. Eventually she seized upon the thought and asked about what was bugging her.

"Tara, don't you live on the opposite side of town?" Anne Possible looked at the girl, obviously something was up since she seemed to be… blushing?

"Uh, well, um…" Tara began to talk.

"Moooom!" whined Kim, "Tara and I are friends and we just thought it would be nice to have breakfast together… I can have friends over for breakfast right?"

Anne rolled her eyes as Kim launched into the "Puppy Dog Pout"

"_Fine, if that's how you want to play it Kimmie I'll butt out._"

"Certainly dear, after all I think Ronald has eaten every breakfast here since he turned nine." Ann chortled. It was true. Her and her husband had actually thought about sending the Stoppables a food bill. It wasn't that they were particularly cheap people, it was just that… Well, Ronald ate quite a bit.

"Ron's eating breakfast here?" gasped Tara. "When does he usually show up?"

She shot a look at Kim that was obvious – "_Why didn't you tell me that?_"

Ann looked at her wrist watch, "In about… 40 minutes or so."

Tara clutched at her backpack and looked at Kim. "Kim. I _need_ to use your bathroom, right _now_!"

"_She can't be serious…_" Kim looked at Tara incredulously.

The petite blonde just locked her stare.

"_Ok, she's serious._"

"Upstairs, to the left." Kim stated, still slightly disbelieving the intensity that Tara was throwing off.

As Tara bounced up the stairs with her bag in tow, Kim's mom shot Kim a quizzical glance.

"What's that all about Kim?" she asked.

Kim shrugged, indicating that she didn't know. It was sort of the truth actually.

Why would someone get so worked up over _Ron_?

-

"That was nice", said Ron Stoppable, the sarcasm dripping from his voice.

"You don't like Eric very much, do you Ron?" asked Tara as she walked beside him.

Ron shrugged. Of course he didn't like Eric very much – how could he? The man had just driven off with the love of his life.

"Well, he could have offered us a ride too." Ron stated as he stepped over a puddle that had formed from last nights rain.

"Ron", Tara said, "He was on a motorcycle."

"It's the principle of the matter Tara. He could have at least pretended to be sad that he _couldn't_ offer us a ride." Ron's eyes narrowed as he made out the last glimpse of Kim and Eric on his motorcycle burning away towards the school. Kim was holding onto Eric's waist _far_ too tightly for Ron's taste.

Tara blinked. This was Kim's plan and while Tara had a great deal of confidence in Kim's ability to be, well, sneaky – things hadn't really turned out like she had been hoping for; at least, not yet. Still, here she was walking along side Ron on their way to school and although she had woken up at 5am and already walked twice the distance on her way from her own house to Kim's, she had gotten the time with Ron that she had wanted.

"_Now I just have to make it count. Let's change the topic, talking about Eric is obviously a sore point_"

"Thanks Ron," Tara said sweetly.

Ron turned his head and gave Tara an inquiring look, "For what?"

"For the present silly!" she giggled.

"Oh, yeah… hey Tara I'm sorry about your birthday party. I guess I kind of made a scene."

Tara continued smiling at Ron.

"It's ok Ron, I understand things… Bonnie can be kind of high strung. I mean, she's my best friend and everything… but she sometimes goes overboard."

Tara frowned a little bit. She was still worried about what exactly had gone on in that closet – Bonnie had been very unforthcoming about the entire episode. Tara just chalked it up to Bonnie being embarrassed and while she desperately wanted to know what had happened, she figured that Kim's word that Ron would _never_ do anything perverted to anyone, let alone Bonnie, was good enough for her. After all, Kim had known Ron since they were both kids. If anyone knew the inner workings of Ron Stoppable, it was definitely her.

"Is she under some kind of stress right now or something?" Ron asked.

His memory of the previous day and the bizarre behavior that Bonnie had exhibited still featured prominently in his mind – in fact it had been the only thing he had been able to concentrate on all morning. He figured that since Tara was Bonnie's best friend she would be more likely than anyone else to know what, if anything, Bonnie Rockwaller was up to.

"_You know Ron, there is always the chance that Bonnie is playing you like a fool. She could be setting you up to embarrass you, or to get back at Kim, or… Who the hell knows? This is Bonnie Rockwaller we're talking about!_"

"Hmm, I don't think so – at least, not anything more than usual. There's co-captaining the cheer squad, all the clubs, dance committee, yearbook committee and probably half a dozen committee's I've forgotten about. Then there are all the advanced placement classes she's taking. She has a lot of work to do."

Tara smiled at Ron. This wasn't _exactly_ what she had been hoping for, but at least her and Ron were talking. And frankly, she found it sweet that despite what Bonnie had done to him at the party that Ron seemed to be genuinely concerned for her.

"_This is why I like this guy – he's so sweet._"

"That's gotta be pretty rough, I don't know how she does it. I barely managed to get my gentleman's C from Mr. Barkin last semester."

Tara giggled.

"_Seriously, I __**do**__ wonder how Bon-Bon does it. I mean, all that work and she practically runs the school too. Maybe she was being honest with me? Maybe she's just looking for a way out, or a way to blow off a little steam… Or maybe… _"

All of a sudden Ron stopped walking.

"_Maybe… she loves me?_"

It was a bizarre revelation and one that Ron hadn't really pondered before. Sure, considering the way that Bonnie had acted yesterday it was pretty obvious (at least if she was on the level) that she _liked_ Ron - but it didn't answer _why_. Maybe Bonnie had been harboring a secret crush for Ron for a long time now and all those put downs, all those insults, the constant barrage of _losers_ were just Bonnie's way of getting Ron's attention within the bounds of the schools social structure.

"Ron are you ok?" asked Tara.

Ron shook his head. He needed time to think about this some more. He felt… oddly, very _sad_ for Bonnie, almost like in some way she was a kindred spirit. After all, Ron knew in agonizing detail what it was like to be in love with someone but to be trapped in a relationship that wouldn't let you express it.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Just thinking." Ron stated.

Tara chuckled, "Well that's good, it puts at least one myth about you to rest!"

Ron paused for a second, his eyes studying Tara.

"_Did she just joke with me?_"

-

Steve Barkin finished checking the last pupil off his homeroom attendance list and then glanced upwards at the wall clock.

"_Almost time._"

Steve Barkin was a good man. He had been a good friend, a good son, a good soldier and ultimately a good teacher. He had done a lot of things in his life that had caused him to lose sleep, but never in his entire life had he ever thought of himself as above the rules.

It just wasn't in his character.

"_I sure hope that this doesn't come back to bite me in the ass._"

There was a subtle rap on the classroom door and Steve rose from his desk to open it. Outside, waiting in the hall was _her_, the newest student to Middleton High. When she had come to him the other day with the transfer notice and transcripts he had gawked in disbelief. It wasn't that they didn't look official, it was just… well the entire situation was so damn weird. He had pretended to be inept, not sure of what he was doing and he had told her that he needed to check it out, to make some phone calls. It was an attempt to buy some time so he could sort out what was really happening.

"Are you ready? Did you get your books?" he asked the young woman in the hall. She merely nodded back at him.

She had persuaded him otherwise by placing a call on her cell phone to her "school". There was a short conversation in a language that Steve didn't speak and then she had handed the phone to him. The man on the other side, like the girl, spoke impeccable English and they had quite a long conversation. Steve, initially reluctant, had been made to understand a great many things. Things such as how a new scoreboard, football uniforms and weight training equipment were on their way to his athletic department.

"Ok, then step inside and wait here", he said.

It felt dirty, like he had been bought out, but he knew that it really wasn't up to him. He had checked the transcripts today before school and they actually _were_ legitimate. He couldn't deny the girl entry into his class, not on that count anyway. Still, the rest of her story was just a little too hard to swallow.

The classroom noise had died down to a few scattered whispers and all eyes were on the front of the room as Steve Barkin and his newest charge made their way to in front of his wooden teachers desk. Two pairs of eyes in particular, one brown, one green, stared with a great deal of interest at what was happening.

"_Huh? What? Is that…"_

"_What is __**she**__doing here!"_

"Ladies and Gentlemen!" Steve Barkin interjected, "May I have your attention!"

"We have a new student that will be joining our home room today. She's come from a long ways outside of Middleton and I want everyone to show her the best Mad Dog hospitality that you can muster."

Steve took a sidelong look at the girl next to him. She seemed to catch his glance and she gave him a soft, reassuring nod.

"_God help me if this is some kind of a prank._"

"Could we please have a warm welcome for our newest Mad Dog…"

Steve Barkin seemed to swallow for a moment, obvious ill at ease with what he was about to say next.

"Ahem… Yori Stoppable!"

-

A/N:

Well, there you go – Yori is finally on the scene, and what a scene it is! I'm sure a great deal many of my readers guessed way back in chapter 2 that this (or something like this) was going to happen. I almost feel bad for Ron, I keep throwing complications after complications at him. Although, I bet a lot of the guys reading this fic wish they had his problems…

Once again, thanks for reading and if you've gotten this far and haven't left a review yet – Why not?!?!

QC


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5 – School Daze

-

"What!" simultaneously exclaimed Ron and Kim.

"Jinx owe me…" Ron began, but the look on Kim's face made him fall silent immediately.

"Ron, this is _so_ not the time for that!"

The classroom had already broken out in scattered murmurs that seemed to be building in intensity despite Steve Barkin's attempts to silence them.

Ron leaned over and began to whisper to Kim.

"KP, I'm sure there is some explanation… like… maybe she's undercover?"

"Yeah, but why… WHY STOPPABLE? Ron, look at her – no one is going to believe that she's your relative." Kim complained.

"I'll have you know KP that the Stoppable clan is quite a bit more diverse than you think. For instance, I have cousins who are Methodists!"

"Attention!" shouted Mr. Barkin, he had expected the disruption in his class and he braced himself for what he knew was coming – complete chaos.

Slowly the talking seemed to subside. Ron looked over to his left and noticed that Tara was looking at him with questioning eyes. Bonnie on the other hand was staring directly at Yori, most likely sizing up the new girls threat to her own popularity, or her eventual standing in the food chain.

"Ms. Stoppable", began Steve Barkin, "Please take a seat at an open desk."

Yori looked at Mr. Barkin, smiling sweetly and then dissolved the poor man's class into anarchy with what she said next.

"Mrs. Stoppable please, and may I sit next to my husband?"

Kim instantly bolted up in her seat, loudly slamming her hands down on the desks surface. She wanted to say something, say _anything_, but the situation was just so absurd that she found herself completely tongue-tied.

Ron Stoppable squirmed in his seat and withered under the stares of his classmates – stares that burned him with the intensity of a thousand suns. The men in the class had no shame and it was obvious what they were thinking; "_That dirty bastard! She's beautiful!_" Most of the women on the other hand looked at Ron with utter disbelief; "_Ron? She's married to RON?_" Two women however held obviously different opinions and they were expressed plainly on their faces.

Bonnie Rockwaller stared at him with a glare that bore straight through his soul. Ron had seen many looks of disgust from Bonnie over the years that they had known each other, but he had never quite seen _this_ level of contempt and for the first time in his life Ron felt like he had vaguely done something to deserve her ire – it was a disturbing revelation.

"_Oh shit! Bonnie! She confesses to me and then… Oh God, she's going to kill me!_"

All hopes of Ron becoming Bonnie's "friend" seemed to evaporate in a flash and Ron's tried to divert his eyes to the side, but then caught a glance at Tara – she looked distraught, almost as if she was going to cry.

"_Tara? E tu, Tara?"_

The petite blonde's was obviously upset, her eyes rimmed with tears. She reached over to Bonnie's desk and held the brunette's hand.

"_Right… Tara is Bonnie's friend; I bet she hates me now too. She probably thinks I was playing Bonnie… GOD I AM SO STUPID!_"

"Cheese and crackers people! Be quiet!" shouted Mr. Barkin at the top of his lungs.

Slowly the room began to come back to order and Ron, not finding a safe place to put his gaze finally settled on staring down directly at his desk.

"_I wonder if this is what it feels like to be on death row?_"

"Possible!" said Barkin, "Since you're already up – switch places with… " he paused for a moment, not believing what he was going to say next, "_Mrs. _Stoppable."

Kim's mouth hung open. She had been sitting at the same desk next to Ron nearly her entire school career. It was just what she did! And now, here in the matter of minutes, she had been usurped from her place and banished to… the front row, where all teenagers dreaded to be. She wanted to weep.

"Ron!" Kim hissed under her breath as she gathered up her stuff, "After. Class. Spill."

If it was possible, Ron shrank even deeper into his chair. Kim was obviously not too happy with him right now and even though he was just as surprised as she was at whatever Yori was trying to do, he knew that it was unlikely he would escape the day without some bruising – emotional as well as physical.

Kim strode down towards the front of the class, passing Yori who was on her way towards the back. The two women stared at each other for an agonizing second, both faces split with smiles so strained it looked like their heads would flip open. There was a brief moment of contact where the emotions were so high that everyone in the room was expecting a blow out, only to be relieved when both girls broke away from each other and headed towards their respective seats.

"Good morning _Danna-sama_", Yori said sweetly as she sat down next to Ron.

"Yori!" Ron exclaimed as softly as he could, "What's going on? Why did you say that?"

"That's it!" exclaimed Mr. Barkin, his patience long past the breaking point, "You _will_ be quiet in my class or you _will_ get D-hall. Am I making myself understood."

Ron meekly nodded, not wanting to spend any more "fun time" with Vinnie or Big Mike. He turned his head to the side and looked at Yori – the girl didn't seem to be disturbed at all. In fact, she was staring straight ahead, hands folded on her desk and portraying the very picture of rapt attention.

"Now class," began Mr. Barkin, "If you're done watching the Stoppable family drama, maybe we can get some announcements done!"

Homeroom passed quickly and the class began to empty out in preparation for the change to first period. Ron saw Tara and Bonnie talking for a few seconds in hushed tones and then they both left the room together, but not before Bonnie could send yet another withering death glare at Ron.

Ron shuddered and wondered what position corpses occupied on the food chain.

Kim, predictably, wasted no time in leaping from her new desk and rounding about on Yori.

"What the heck do you think you're doing!" she exclaimed at the pretty asian girl.

"I am sitting next to my husband, Possible-san", Yori retorted with strained grace.

"About that…" Ron began.

"Ron, not now!" growled Kim, "Look I don't know what you're playing at Yori but did you even bother to think about how this would affect Ron? You know there are girls here that lo- er, like him! What about their feelings?"

"_What the hell was I about to say?_" Kim thought to herself.

"Possible-san, I am _not_ playing at anything. Ron-kun is my husband, despite what you believe." Yori stated, the tension clear in her voice.

"He's only 16, how is that even possible?" barked Kim.

"About that…" Ron tried again.

"Ron, not now!" said both Kim and Yori.

For a second, it looked like Ron was actually considering it – but decided he didn't need a soda _that_ badly.

Yori reached over and grabbed Ron's hand, "Come Ron-kun, we need to go to our next class."

Ron rather lamely allowed the dark haired ninja and his purported "wife", lead him from his desk and out the class-room. Right before he hit the door, he turned his head over his shoulder and gave Kim the most confused look he could muster, hoping that she would realize that he was just as much in the dark as she was.

Kim watched the two of them leave. Something was obviously up and the inscrutable ninja girl certainly wasn't talking. She'd try to corner Ron later, but from the way he was acting Kim was pretty sure that he didn't know what was going on either.

"_Sure, Yori isn't a super-villain, but still… I've got to find out what she's up to._"

Unfortunately for Kim, her and Ron didn't have first period together this semester, so she wouldn't be able to follow the two and question them more. In any case she resolved to corner her best friend at lunch and try to get whatever information he _did_ know out of him.

"_Just because I have to wait to talk to Ron doesn't mean I can't get a little head start…"_

Kim reached for her pocket, retrieving her Kimmunicator. Flipping the lid open, she waited until the link was established and then spoke.

"Wade, we've got a problem."

-

"Bonnie, do you think that's for real? Do you think she's really married to Ron?" asked Tara with a wavering voice.

Bonnie put her arms around her friend and whispered, "I don't know… probably not. You know how Kim and Ron are like weirdness magnets. I mean, c'mon it's _Ron_, who in their right mind would want to marry him?"

Tara looked up at her friend and pouted.

"Oh, sorry…" Bonnie muttered lamely.

The two girls hadn't gone to their next class, instead Tara had gone to the nurse's office and Bonnie had gone with her. They had claimed to be having "stomach aches", but in actuality Tara just needed a place where she could cry without anyone seeing her.

"Bonnie? What do you think I should do?"

Bonnie Rockwaller was at an impasse. Secretly this had been the outcome, or at least something close to it, that she had wanted all along – Tara not dating Ron. Of course, this wasn't exactly what she had planned, but it would work all the same. Now however, that it had come to pass, she felt a brief twinge of guilt over what she had attempted to do.

"_Well, technically I didn't do __**anything**__. This was all the losers fault!_"

It did make her feel a little better to think of things that way. She knew on some level that she was just as guilty, if not more so, for what she had been contemplating doing to Tara, but she also knew that there was a big difference between thinking about something and actually doing it.

She didn't like to think about the fact that the only reason why she hadn't _done it_, was because she had been beaten to the punch. Such self-reflection was something that Bonnie fastidiously avoided.

"Tara, maybe you should just cut your losses. There are plenty of guys out there. I'm sure if you wanted to I could smooth things over with Josh…"

Tara sniffed.

"I don't want Josh Monkey," she said, using Ron's appellation for the boy.

"He's very popular Tara and cute too…" Bonnie tried to soothe.

"And totally gay."

"_There is that huh?_ _Sorry T, I just don't know what to do._"

Bonnie, knowing better than to push the _Josh_ thing too much right now, begged off that tactic. It wasn't likely that Tara really cared about anything right now other than just venting her feelings and Bonnie knew it. She just wished there was something she could do for the girl.

"_I could tell her about the confession he gave me. I could tell Tara about Ron telling me he… loved me._"

Bonnie had been avoiding mentioning anything about what had gone on in the closet to Tara and she wondered why. Was it because she didn't want to upset Tara? It was obvious that the petite blonde was pretty upset already, so it was doubtful that it would make the situation all that much worse. And really… would Tara be all that upset to begin with?

Bonnie thought hard.

"_Stop thinking like yourself for a moment and think like Tara. What would she do? She'd…_"

Bonnie looked at Tara with a critical eye. Tara was probably the kindest, sweetest girl that Bonnie had ever met and she knew it. She wouldn't get upset at something like that…

"_She'd probably have just asked me if I was going to go out with him._"

Bonnie sighed. Now that the imminent threat of losing her best friend had been dealt with, she was starting to see the situation a little more clearly. Bonnie realized now that she had been afraid, terribly afraid of losing Tara. She didn't know why, but feeling this way and with Tara shuddering in her arms, suddenly a big sob welled up in her throat. Her body spasmed lightly as she too, began to cry.

"Bonnie?" gasped Tara, looking in amazement at her best friend. It wasn't that Bonnie _didn't_ cry – Tara and her had been friends long enough for her to witness that, it was just that she didn't do it very regularly, and hardly ever when her shrewish sisters weren't around.

"S-s-sorry T…" Bonnie began.

"_I'm a terrible, terrible person!_"

Tara was getting afraid now. She'd seen Bonnie get like this before and she knew that nothing good would come of it. She stopped crying herself, wiping her eyes, and put her hands on her friends shoulder.

"Whatever it is Bonnie, it's ok. Let it out." Tara cooed to the other girl.

Bonnie sniffled, her eyes crying freely right now and she nodded at Tara. She wanted to say something, but her lips were distorted from crying and would not form the words.

Tara wrapped her arms around Bonnie and brought her into a tight hug. "Bonnie, I love you, ok?" she whispered into her friends ear. The result wasn't exactly what Tara had been hoping for and Bonnie just started crying all the harder.

"Ron… he…" Bonnie started, but was cut off by her own sob.

"_What's wrong with me? I feel so guilty…_"

"Bonnie? What about Ron?" asked Tara.

Bonnie tried to pull herself together. It was a struggle, she was dealing with emotions that she wasn't used to handling and it left her confused and mentally raw. Slowly, she tried moving her mouth, hoping to find the right words.

"In the closet T…" Bonnie slowly began, "Ron told me that he… um…"

Tara's big blue eyes stared into Bonnie's own and for a moment Bonnie was lost in the depths of her friends gaze. Tara had the biggest, bluest, deepest eyes Bonnie had ever seen and she had always been a little envious of them.

"He told me he… _loved me_." Bonnie spat out.

"Are you… Are you serious Bonnie?" gasped Tara, her already huge eyes widening even further.

Bonnie nodded.

"Tara, he said all this stuff to me and then… he said he _loved me_ and then… he kissed me." Bonnie sniffled.

Tara's countenance abruptly changed. "That creep!" she said.

"Huh?" asked Bonnie, slightly bewildered.

"How could he break your heart like that!" railed Tara, the fire obviously starting to come into her voice.

"Huh?" asked Bonnie again, not quite getting what Tara was saying.

"What are you talking about T?" she said.

"Wait… isn't that why you are crying? He told you that he loved you and then you find out that he's _married_?" Tara asked.

Bonnie, who until a few seconds ago had still been sniffling, let out a huge snort and started to laugh.

"No way! Are you kidding? ME crushing on Stoppable?" Bonnie started to laugh even harder, but then she remembered who had been comforting whom just a few minutes ago and about what, so she wisely decided to bite her tongue before she hurt Tara's feelings.

"Well, then why are you crying Bonnie?" asked Tara whom seemed slightly off-put.

"Because… well, lets just say… because I can be pretty stupid sometimes." Bonnie stated.

Tara eyed here friend warily. Bonnie wasn't the type of girl to wear her emotions on her sleeve, so it was unlikely that Tara would get any more information out of her. However, she really _was_ worried about her. People usually thought of Bonnie as the cold, heartless bitch at the top of the school's food chain – but that was only because they didn't know her like Tara did. They didn't know about her life, about her family, about how _lonely_ she was.

"_She'll tell me about it when she can,_" thought Tara as she warmly patted Bonnie's hand.

"Bonnie, I've got to tell you something – something important." Tara's voice was soft, yet firm.

Bonnie nodded to her friend.

"I don't think I want to give up on Ron just yet. I don't believe that he's really married," she said.

Bonnie had a sinking feeling in her stomach. She had hoped that with this new development that Tara would, if not forget; at least temporarily shelve her plans to pursue Ron. It didn't seem however that fate was going to be that kind to her. Bonnie knew instinctively that this time, she wasn't going to get a reprieve and that sooner or later she was going to have to make some very hard decisions – decisions that might find her completely and utterly alone.

"and Bonnie…" continued Tara, "I won't hold it against you if you want to go out with him too."

Bonnie's face contorted in shock. What, exactly was Tara thinking? Ron Stoppable could confess to her a hundred million times and as far as she was concerned and there was no way that she'd ever go out with him.

"Tara, Please…" said Bonnie with a look of exasperation on her face.

Tara just smiled at Bonnie and shrugged. She had said what she wanted to and she had meant it. She wasn't ready to give up quite yet on Ron, at least not without finding out what this entire marriage deal was about. She had also meant exactly what she said to Bonnie. Despite her somewhat ditzy and confused demeanor, Tara was a girl with a great deal of emotional intuition and it was to her credit that she realized one fundamental thing.

"_Ron would probably be really good for her._"

-

The tension at one of the dining tables in the Middleton High lunch cafeteria was so high and so obvious that it took a great deal of effort for most passersby's to not stare and gawk at what was sure to become a bloodbath of some sort. In the middle of this tempest in a teapot was one young Ron Stoppable, his ever-loyal friend Rufus at his side (or in his pocket as the case may be). To the left of this exceptionally nervous young man was his best friend and love interest, the fiery Kimberly Ann Possible, who despite being the girl who could "do anything", was having a colossal amount of difficulty maintaining her composure in the face of recent developments. The reason for this sat directly to the right of Ron – a slender young girl with almond shaped eyes and straight black hair. She was a stunning beauty, lithe, dexterous, polite and graceful. She was also doing her best to annoy the hell out of Kim.

"Say what you will Possible-san, but Ron-kun is my husband no matter how much you dislike it." Yori calmly stated as she looked directly into Ron's bewildered face.

"How can you say that when he doesn't even _remember_ getting married to you?" protested Kim as she slammed her fist down on the table.

Ron wondered weakly what he had done to offend God so much as to deserve what was obviously going to be a gory end. He turned away from the two arguing women for a minute and caught the attention of Bonnie Rockwaller, who was walking with Tara away from the lunch line.

"_Great, here it comes – yep! Bonnie's patented 'You're a piece of shit on the bottom of my shoe' look. Haven't seen that one since… oh I don't know, middle school? Oh and look at Tara behind her, let's see… That expression, hmm – I think I'm going to go with 'pity' for 500 Alex._"

Ron closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead. He had to do something, there had to be some way out of this mess – if only he was smart enough to figure it out. In any case, he knew that he couldn't just let Kim and Yori bicker about this – if it didn't stop soon he was wondering if they were going to start coming to blows.

"_Maybe they could pillow fight instead… in their underwear… Grr, head in the game Stoppable!_"

Ron tried to banish all perverted thoughts from his head, mentally collecting the image he had started to create and filing it away for "later". Yes, _that_ later.

"Ladies! Amp down!" Ron said, raising his hands up in the air. He needed to get to the bottom of this before things got out of hand.

"As my husband wishes," stated Yori with a huff, turning her back away from Kim.

"As your…" Kim was about to launch into another tirade, but Ron gave her a look that begged her to reconsider. It took her a great deal of self-control, but she brought herself up short and then sat back in her chair and crossed her arms.

"Okay, now…" Ron began, "Yori – Why do you think we are married?"

"Because _Danna-sama_, we _are_ married," she responded blithely.

"Okayyy…" Ron was obviously not going to get anywhere with that line of thinking.

Yori was carrying a small purse and she reached into it and produced a carefully folded flap of papers.

"Here," she said and handed them to Ron.

Ron took the offered paper with a slight bit of apprehension, almost as if they would poison him or burn his hand. Slowly he unfolded them, his eyes scanning over the contents.

"Hmm…" he said.

"What Ron? What is it?" asked Kim in an anxious voice.

"Kim…"

"Yes?"

"I don't know. I can't read Japanese." Ron shrugged and handed the papers back to Yori.

"They are marriage papers," stated Yori as she started to carefully fold them up again.

Kim looked at Yori, trying to decide if it was worth it to take the risk…

"They are only a copy Possible-san, the original ones are on record in Japan." Yori said as she tucked the "copy" back in her purse.

"_Well, I guess that would have been too easy anyway…_" Kim thought to herself.

"Ron, did you sign those papers?" asked Kim.

Ron's face screwed up. He was pretty certain that he _hadn't_ gotten married when he was in Japan, but he also knew that sometimes things just had a way of happening to him that were damn near unfathomable.

"I… don't think so? I don't remember?" he ventured.

"What do you mean you don't remember?" asked Yori, her voice was loud and the hurt tone in it made Ron flinch.

"_I am SO not getting out of this one alive,"_ he thought to himself.

"Uh… Yori… you know, I think I would remember something like getting married…" he began to say until he noticed the slightly hurt look on Yori's face. He hastened to add, "to such a pretty girl!"

It seemed to work, at least a little.

"Ron-kun, don't you remember that night in the mountains? The sky was so clear and the stars shone so brightly…" Yori held her hands up to her chest and smiled brightly.

"What night in the mountains _Ron_? How come I've never heard of a night in the mountains?" asked Kim, slightly perturbed that Ron seemed to have been holding something out on her.

If you strained to listen you probably could have heard the synapses in Ron Stoppables brain starting to fire. He was desperately trying to recall exactly what Yori was talking about. Slowly, realization began to dawn on his face…

"Wait, do you mean that one night…" Ron started to blush.

Yori nodded.

"Ron-kun, it was so special to me, the words you said were so sweet," she let out an overly girlish sigh.

The lunchroom started to get quiet as the students at the other tables strained to hear the conversation that was unfolding. The drama surrounding Ron, the peculiar circumstances and the new student who claimed to be his wife were of supreme interest to most of the students at Middleton High today.

"Oh _Ron_?" said Kim, "What exactly did you two _do_ up there in those mountains?"

Ron looked visibly nervous.

"Um… Nothing KP! I swear! Nothing!" he blurted out.

"Ron-kun!" gasped Yori, " How could you say that!"

Yori's outburst had gained the attention of everyone in the room and Ron could literally _feel_ their eyes on him.

"I mean, I… uh…" Ron started to stammer.

Yori stood up, obviously upset. She pointed an accusing finger at Ron and then yelled at the top of her voice, "Ron Stoppable! You told me you'd accept responsibility!"

"RON!" gasped Kim.

"No, it's not like that Kim!" blurted Ron, " I never said I'd marry her!"

Yori gave Ron a look of supreme hurt; she covered her delicate features with her hands and ran from the lunchroom sobbing, leaving behind a cacophony of gossip in her wake.

"Wait! Yori!" said Ron, he started to get up from his seat only to find himself suddenly off balance by a stinging blow to his cheek – it was Kim and she had done something she had never done before; slapped him.

"Ron Stoppable! You are _such_ a pig!" she screamed at him, getting up herself and stomping madly out of the cafeteria.

Ron watched Kim leave and then touched the side of his face where she had slapped him. It burned a little and he rubbed it gently.

"Rufus old-buddy, I just want you to know that I'm leaving everything I own to you." Ron stated grimly.

"Hnk?" responded his faithful pet.

"Yeah, I have a feeling that before the week is out I'm going to be a dead man."

Rufus hung his head sadly, empathizing with his master.

Ron shook his head and wondered how things had gotten to this point. Now that he had talked to Yori, he _did_ remember that night – and he remembered the words that he had said to the young ninja girl. He even remembered signing those papers, however he _hadn't_ realized what they were.

Despite what Kim thought, Ron had been a perfect gentleman that night – Yori had come to him distraught and crying and he had only tried to comfort her. It turned out that a distant branch of the Yamanouchi clan had set plans in motion to take control of the Yamanouchi School once the venerable Master Sensei passed away. Ron didn't understand the entire depth of the archaic Japanese politics, but the problem seemed to stem from the fact that Yori was a girl and thus couldn't qualify as the heir to the School.

Ron, foolishly, had told her that he would help her any way he could.

"_Oh man what am I going to do? I gotta find out if this marriage thing is even legal, and I totally have to explain it to Kim – I didn't do what she thinks I did!_"

-

The walk home from school that day was the longest walk Ron Stoppable had ever experienced. He remembered vividly the looks that everyone gave him on his way out the door; most people had either seen, or heard about the scene in the cafeteria and the gossip was in full swing. The rumor was that Ron had gotten Yori pregnant and forced her to marry him. Ron sighed and hung his head. It was the furthest thing from the truth, and he lamented, he had the virginity to prove it.

"_This is so my luck – I get convicted of a crime I didn't even get to enjoy committing!_"

Before Ron had left the school grounds he had tried to find Bonnie Rockwaller. Despite everything that had happened today, he felt that he should at least check to make sure that she still didn't intend to meet him at the library later on. He knew it was unlikely, but he also knew that he would be worried about it all night if he didn't check. The image of Bonnie waiting for him, watching the clock and getting increasingly angrier was one that made his blood run cold. He never did get a chance to ask Bonnie, but the withering glance that she had given him when he had tried to approach her pretty much told him that his dance card was free for the night.

"_Well, I guess it doesn't matter now. Bonnie hating me I suppose is a good thing – or at least, a normal thing. It was kinda creepy the way she was acting towards me yesterday. I just hope I didn't hurt her too much._"

It wasn't Ron's fault, at least – not really. Sure he had mistakenly made a promise to Yori that he hadn't foreseen the consequences of, but it wasn't his _intention_ to play around. Still, he knew that his intentions didn't amount to a hill of beans – it was all results that mattered. It was with a heavy heart that he walked the remaining length of his street up to his house and towards his front door.

Ron went for his key, but then stopped when he noticed that the door was unlocked. Cautiously he reached his hand out towards the door knob and gently turned it, opening the door slowly.

Inside, dressed in long flowing white robes, was Yori – kneeling down, her hands pushed forward, fingers touching the ground and with her legs tucked under her.

"_Danna-sama_," she began, "Please accept this humble wife and take care of her."

Ron was so taken aback that he instantly blurted out the first thing that came to his mind, no matter how unmanly it was.

He called for his mother.

-

Bonnie Rockwaller turned down her car stereo as she reached for her cell-phone. She was on her way home, but like usual the after-school traffic was a mess right around the campus, so she was for the most part stuck for the time being. She looked at the back of the phone, the caller ID displayed a familiar number and she flipped the device open and held it to her ear.

"Hello? Daddy?" she said.

Bonnie didn't know why, but she was excited. Her father rarely called her during the week, usually he was far too busy and Bonnie only managed to keep in contact with him via a weekly Sunday evening phone call that lasted precisely 15 minutes.

"Yes, I can come over!" Bonnie was smiling as she said this, a genuine smile that people didn't get to see often.

Bonnie closed her cell-phone and put it down in between the two front seats. Her father hadn't explained to her _why_ he wanted her to drive over to his house, but he did mention having dinner with him, something Bonnie hadn't done in a long time. She hesitated for a moment, wondering if she should call her mother and then thought, "_Why bother, she'll probably just try to guilt me into coming home to her instead._"

Bonnie's mother always came home from work at the same time every day. The first thing she would do when she entered the house would be to see if her daughters were ok, and then she would proceed to cook dinner. Frankly, Bonnie could care less about dinner most of the time – she was fully capable of getting her own food and had told her mother this on many occasions. However, her mom always insisted that Bonnie, Connie and Lonnie all eat with her every night.

It was an uncomfortable 30 minutes to say the least.

But that wasn't going to happen today. Bonnie smiled and then turned the radio up as she pulled out of the school parking lot and made her way towards the freeway that would take her to Upperton, to her father's apartment, and away from the boring little suburban home with the clingy mother and cruel sisters.

In an uncharacteristic display of glee, Bonnie Rockwaller started to hum along to the radio as she drove down the freeway; practically giddy from the attention of the one person in the world she loved the most.

-

A/N:

Well I hope people enjoyed this chapter. If you're clever you can probably spot the next plot development fairly easily! Anyway I am fairly pleased with the way things are progressing – the main characters have all been introduced and I'm ready to start kicking things into high gear. There was a mention in one of the reviews of a love triangle. All I can say to that is, "Not enough sides".

Thanks for reading this far, and please review.

QC


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6 – Honeymoon Night?

-

"Now Ronald," said Gene Stoppable as he looked at his obviously distraught son, "I know this may be a little unusual, but you're going to have to bear with it for a while."

It wasn't really the advice that Gene had wanted to give, but certain events during the day had made it almost impossible for him to say otherwise. He mentally kicked himself for the hundredth time and thought, "_I should have known that there were strings attached_."

"How long Dad? I can't do this – I'm too young to be married!" Ron exclaimed, his voice cracking in nervousness.

"What's wrong son? She's a very lovely young lady and she seems to really care about you…" Gene's voice trailed off; he couldn't believe he was trying to talk his only child into what more or less amounted to an arraigned marriage.

Thus was the power of the Yamanouchi group. Before today Gene had not known very much about the shadowy group of Japanese businessmen that owned Tri-City Insurance, the company he worked for – now however, he was wishing he knew quite a great deal less. In his meeting with the regional supervisor this morning it had been made clear to him in no uncertain terms that his future depended on him forcing his son to go along with this charade of a union.

"What's wrong? What's wrong! Your sixteen year old son is married to a girl you've never even met before and you ask me what's wrong?"

Ron was freaking out. He couldn't believe how blasé his old man was being about the entire situation. While he had no experience of his own to go off of, he was _fairly_ certain that if he came home one day and found out his teenage son had gotten married that he'd… well he didn't know _exactly_ what he would do, but talking calmly probably wouldn't be very high on the list!

"Ronald… Look, I just need a little time ok? Just give me some time and I'll try to sort everything out." Gene said. He meant it too – he'd try to work out some sort of deal with Mr. Nakamura, but barring that he'd just bite the bullet and lose his job. It would make for hard times for his family, but he would stomach it in the name of Ron's future.

"_I really can't guess why he's being so obstinate. If I was his age and married to such a pretty girl…_" Gene shook his head to banish the thought; he shouldn't be thinking of his son's wife that way.

"Ron, is there some other problem? Do you not like her?" Gene asked.

Ron shrugged. It wasn't that he didn't like Yori, in fact he really did think that she was a great person to hang out with, it was just that he didn't _like-like_ her.

"She's very beautiful son," Gene prodded.

Ron nodded. It was true – Yori was on a very short list of women that Ron Stoppable considered the most beautiful in the world. Her silky black hair framed a face that sported exotic, graceful features and pouting lips that just begged to be kissed. Her body was strong and lithe like an athletes, yet still sporting curves in what Ron considered "all the right places". It wasn't that Ron had never thought of her _that way_, it was just that he had had his heart set on Kim for so long that he was reluctant to give up on what he was slowly beginning to think was a fools dream.

"_Even if she wasn't pissed at me right now, it'd take an act of God to get her away from Eric._"

Ron wondered if maybe it was worth giving it a try, being married to Yori that was. Sure, it was a little unconventional, but he didn't _hate_ her – far from it. Maybe this was what God had in store for Ron Stoppable from the beginning and all he was doing at this point was fighting against the inevitable. Maybe…

"The room's ready!" shouted Meryl Stoppable from the top of the stairs.

Ron was brought out of his reflective reverie and cocked an eye at his father.

"Room?" he asked.

"Ah yeah, well about that son…" Gene Stoppable paused for a moment to wipe the sweat from his brow – all the excitement from the day had made him a nervous wreck and he was showing it on his skin.

"Yori's family had some things delivered today…"

Before Gene could further explain, Ron had already sprinted up the stairs and ran to his room. What he saw there blew his mind.

"_Gone! All gone!_"

Ron was overcome with a brief mourning for his personal possessions, all of which had seemed to have been removed from his room. Gone were his GWA posters, his Steel Toe and Pain King autographed wall hangings, even his off-color faux wooden desk that he had used since the 4th grade. All of it was gone. He sighed a brief sigh of relief when he noticed that they had at least left Rufus's cage intact – he knew Rufus would be sad without it.

"What happened here?" Ron asked no one in particular.

"Do you like it _Danna-sama_?" came the voice from behind him.

"Y-Yori!" he spurted as he turned around to face the lovely ninja. She had changed clothes and was now wearing a more regular outfit that consisted of a t-shirt with capri style pants.

"Yori! What happened to all my stuff?" Ron asked in a panic.

Yori shrugged at Ron, truthfully she hadn't even been here with the room had been modified, so she didn't know. However she assumed that most of Ron's possessions had been put into storage somewhere.

"I do not know Ron-kun. Perhaps your things are in the attic, or the garage?" she said as she walked past Ron into the bedroom.

"I want them back!" Ron said petulantly.

Yori locked Ron's gaze with her own and then… pouted. A soft, downward glance with a turn of the lips that made Ron suddenly feel like he had just done something terrible to her.

"You… you don't like the room, husband?" Yori asked in a sad, pitiful voice.

"Um… uh… Well, I mean…" Ron stammered. He had fallen into her trap and there was no escape.

"It's very nice, don't you think?" she said, her voice still pleading.

Ron looked around at the room. Truthfully, it _was_ very nice. The furniture was obviously top-notch and probably cost thousands of dollars. It was a great improvement over the second hand stuff that he had previously had, and while there was a distinct feminine touch to everything, he concluded that it actually made him feel somewhat peaceful.

"Yeah… it's good," he said slowly as he looked around. It was odd that Yori had decided to redecorate his room, and although Ron wasn't the sharpest guy you'd find, realization of why she had done this and what it entailed was just starting to seep into his skull when Yori distracted him.

"Here, Ron-kun, here!" said Yori with enthusiasm as she moved across the room to a large armoire. Without a moment's hesitation she flung open the doors and let the contents sparkle in all their glory.

Ron's eyes practically burst out of his head.

"Is that? Is that… _The Nakasumi 3000!_" he shouted, the excitement in his voice palatable.

Yori bounced up and down with glee – obviously she had done her homework about Ron and she felt confident she was about to reap the rewards.

"Yes Ron-kun it is! It's the HD-limited edition, complete with built in surround sound, flat screen display and wireless controllers. Oh and here…" Yori bent down and pulled out a drawer, revealing to Ron the precious contents within.

"Oh. My. God." Ron said as his eyes bugged out even farther.

Yori turned around and smiled at Ron.

"The entire Nakasumi game library!" she proudly stated.

Ron, his legs moving unbidden of his own will, approached the treasure chest of entertainment like a zombie moving in for the kill. His eyes scanned the surface of the spines of the DVD cases and he mentally catalogued each one for future enjoyment.

"Perhaps Ron-kun, after dinner we may enjoy a game or two?" Yori said hopefully.

Ron nodded. That didn't seem like such a bad idea.

Yori moved next to Ron and brought her lips up gently to his ear. Ron could feel her hot breath tickle his neck and he found himself paralyzed, completely overcome with sensation.

"And perhaps after that…" Yori whispered, "We can have some more games…"

She let the phrase linger in his ear, then continued.

"In bed."

Yori, with an impish grin on her face then fled the room to go help Meryl Stoppable prepare dinner.

"_Don't give in Stoppable. Don't give in! If you do… God is surely going to strike you down!_"

It was as sobering thought, but one he was sure of. After all, he was Ron Stoppable and things like this simply did _not_ happen to him. Hell, he couldn't even get his best friend of over a decade to give him a second look, and now he had a gorgeous girl plying him with video games and offers of sex?

His entire body shivered in fear, almost as if he could feel the cold of the grave reaching out for him. He knew, without a doubt, that one false step and his life would change forever.

"_It wouldn't be so bad_," he mused, "…_if I was the one calling the shots._"

-

Kim Possible threw down her book bag and flopped into the chair in front of her computer. She hadn't meant to snub Ron on the way home from school, in fact she had actually wanted to talk to him and to apologize for the slap in the cafeteria, but Eric had found her after last period and… well when she was with Eric she had a tendency to do whatever it was he wanted to do, which in this case happened to be a quick date and a drive home.

"_I should probably call Ron and tell him I'm sorry. I don't know what I was thinking, there is no way that Ron would do __**that**__to Yori – I'm certain of it. She was probably just trying to make me mad._"

Kim frowned. Yori had succeeded.

She was just about to reach for her phone when all of a sudden a window popped up on her computer monitor. She grabbed the mouse and clicked on it, bringing up a popular instant messaging program.

**Tarabell2000**: Hey Kim are you there?

Kim put her phone down and started to type.

**BlueFox: **Hi Tara! What's up?

**Tarabell2000**: What else? RON!

**BlueFox**: Yeah about that… I'm totally sorry, I swear I didn't know anything about this!

**Tarabell2000**: It's cool Kim, I could tell! You looked like you were going to spit bullets when she said _Mrs. Stoppable_. LOL

**BlueFox**: I admit, I was pretty shocked. I talked to Ron a little bit at lunch…

**Tarabell2000**: I saw that… what was going on?

**BlueFox**: I think he made some sort of mistake and ended up in a weird sitch.

**Tarabell2000**: Any idea how to feign surprise and shock over IM? GRIN

**BlueFox**: I know, that's Ron for you I suppose… I did ask around a little bit and it turns out that the entire marriage thing isn't completely on the up and up.

**Tarabell2000**: I could have guessed. Ron is kind of… Ron, but even he couldn't forget something like that!

**BlueFox**: I talked to my friend Wade and he did some snooping around – it seems the marriage documents were filed, but since Ron's a minor he'd need his parent's permission to get married…

**Tarabell2000**: Let me guess – no permission?

**BlueFox**: Well yes and no. There's paper work on file, but it's not legit. Someone forged Ron's parent's signatures.

**Tarabell2000**: So basically you're saying, Ron was set up?

**BlueFox**: Yep. I feel terrible about it too, I really let him have it today at lunch…

**Tarabell2000**: Just tell him you're sorry, you two are best friends forever! He'll forgive you I'm sure!

**BlueFox**: I'm sure you're right, still doesn't keep me from feeling guilty.

**Tarabell2000**: NOD. Still, that's really good news, don't you think? It should be easy to clear this all up.

**BlueFox**: That's even IF he wants to clear it up. I think Yori has her claws into him pretty good.

**Tarabell2000**: Oh, I don't know about that…

**BlueFox**: Really? Are you holding out on me Tara?

**Tarabell2000**: Let's just say… I happen to know that Ron has other girls on his mind.

**BlueFox**: SPILL!

**Tarabell2000**: Nope, no can do! I made a promise!

**BlueFox**: Wait… It's not you, is it?

**Tarabell2000**: Well, no… but I'm still not giving up quite yet! I have a PLAN!

**BlueFox**: Why Tara, I had no idea you were so determined! LOL

**Tarabell2000**: I'm full of surprises! Anyway, I've got to go Kim! TTYL BB

**BlueFox**: l8r

Kim clicked close on the window and then sat back in her chair. She couldn't remember a time in her life when things around Ron had ever been so complicated.

"_I guess it had to happen sooner or later, we're growing up after all._"

It was a truth that held both equal amounts of excitement and sadness. Both Kim and Ron were finally maturing and starting to change into the adults that they would be for the rest of their lives and it was an exhilarating feeling to ponder all the limitless possibilities that their futures held. Unfortunately along with all the thoughts of the future also came with some fears – What would happen to them? Would they all stay friends? Would they drift apart?

Kim seriously started to think about it, letting her feelings roam wherever they would. She thought of everyone in her life and what they meant to her and she was overcome with a brief wave of nostalgia that made her almost want to tear up. She decided that she needed to talk to Ron, _tonight_.

Kim started to reach for the phone again like she had earlier, but then stopped. No, not that, it wouldn't do – not the way she was feeling tonight. Ron was her best friend in the entire world, the one person that she always felt that she could trust and rely on and she had lashed out at him because of her own doubts.

She was determined to fix the sitch.

Kim got up from her desk, found her jacket and headed downstairs. Within a couple of minutes she was already out the door and heading through the subdivision to the Stoppable house and hoping that despite what had transpired today, that her and Ron were still as tight as they ever were.

-

Bonnie Rockwaller pushed the food on her plate around with her utensils as she waited for her father Richard to get off of his cell-phone. They were dining out tonight, and while the restaurant was classy and the food well prepared, the atmosphere left something to be desired. Her father was mostly to blame.

Bonnie roughly stabbed an asparagus spear with her fork, swishing it around in the remnants of a buttery sauce that had all but congealed on her plate due to the length of time she had put off finishing her meal. She really wasn't hungry any more and she hadn't actually been eating that much, but she didn't want to let the waiter take her plate away. If she did so, she reasoned, then it would leave her with nothing else to do but stare passively at the room while her father continued to talk on the phone to someone whom obviously rated higher on the food chain than her.

"_Why did I drive all the way to Upperton for this? Did I think that this time was going to be any different – just because he called me!_"

Bonnie blew an errant strand of hair out of her eyes while she looked out of the wide bay window that graced the wall next to her table. The sun had just recently began to dip below the horizon, bathing the outdoor shopping promenade with a dusky purple tone that was briefly punctuated by warm glowing lamps. Nameless people wandered up and down the closed off street, some alone, some holding hands, but all of them seemingly with a purpose. She wondered briefly, what that might be like – to have a purpose.

It would perhaps seem to be a strange thought for such an accomplished young woman to have, but that would be only if one assumed that her pursuit of accolades was for a reason. Bonnie would have liked to have had a reason – a reason for _doing_, a reason for _being_, but the sad fact of the matter was that she did only what was expected of her.

What her father expected of her.

Richard Rockwaller was a demanding man. In business he was a tyrant, bullying and forcing his way with his employees and in private life he wasn't much better. It wasn't that he was mean natured, or even a disagreeable fellow (he could be quite charming under the right circumstances) it was just that he knew, without a doubt that the one and only way to get ahead in this world was to take what you wanted and _damn_ any one or any thing that got in your way; including his own wife and kids.

He hadn't started out that way. No one ever really does. Upon the outset of his career his goals had actually been laudable – providing a safety net of economic security for his children. Unfortunately somewhere along the line, as people are wont to do, he lost his way and the goal had mistakenly become his _reason_. He had not known it, but after already poisoning the temperaments of his two eldest daughters he was perilously close in passing this fatal mistake down to Bonnie as well. Of course, being as far gone as he was, it was doubtful that he cared.

It made what he was about to do, just that much easier.

"Bonnie?" her father asked.

"Hmm?" she replied. She had been staring out the window and hadn't noticed that he had finished his phone call.

"So dear, tell me – What's going on your life these days?" he said with a warm, fatherly smile.

Bonnie was annoyed at her father and the part of her that was the most like him wanted to let loose with a withering sarcastic comment to show him how she felt about being put on hold when they went out to dinner. There was another part of her however that was much more deeply ingrained in her psyche, and this part wanted nothing more than to please her father and to regale him with tales of her most recent accomplishments.

"Well Daddy, I've was voted head of the year book committee – third time in a row I may add. Also I auditioned for the lead role in the spring theatre production; I have it on good authority that I'm considered to already have the part. The cheer squad is going to the state regional's next month and I've developed a new routine that I'm positive will put us in the finals… Hmm, what else? Oh yes – I also…"

Richard Rockwaller stared at his daughter, the picture of rapt attention, except of course that he _wasn't._ It was sort of a ritual that they had between them as father and daughter, Richard would always ask Bonnie what she had been up to and Bonnie would dutifully recount whatever trivial (in Richard's eyes) achievements she had made since their last talk.

"_I wish she wouldn't prattle on so much – it reminds me of her mother._"

"Oh and finally, I was elected chairman of the school's homecoming committee. This year is definitely going to be so much better than last year. I'm thinking of going with a Polynesian theme – "

Bonnie was going full steam ahead and Richard casually glanced at his watch. He needed to bring her up short so that he'd have time to get back home and prepare for his date with Jessica – a new secretary that had just started working for the company. She had proven to be a relatively hard nut to crack, with her being just newly married and all, but Richard had been persistent and now he wanted to reap the rewards of his diligence.

"Bonnie that's great!" he interjected cutting her off.

Bonnie's mouth hung open a tiny bit – she was just about to launch into a complete recollection of how she had come up with the winning entry for the new Middleton High school motto competition when her father cut her off. It made her a little sad but it wasn't unexpected – her dad was a busy man after all and he couldn't afford to waste all his time listening to her dull school life.

"Say Honey, I have a question for you. Actually, maybe there is something that you could help Daddy on." Richard said suavely while gesturing for a waiter.

"Yes Daddy?" Bonnie eagerly asked.

"Do you happen to know a boy by the name of Stoppable?"

Bonnie's expression told her father everything he needed to know. It wasn't a surprise, at least not to him. Gene Stoppable was a bit of a loser, not so bad as to be incompetent (he actually was quite good at his job), but the man lacked ambition and drive and most importantly he had always let people walk all over him. The surprised and semi-disgusted look on Bonnie's face just proved what Richard had already known; the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

"I take it that's a yes, Bonnie?" he asked his daughter.

Bonnie nodded.

A waiter came over to the table and Richard motioned for the check.

"Bonnie, I need you to do a favor for Daddy."

"What Daddy?" she asked quietly. Already she didn't like the direction this conversation was going.

"You see sweetheart, I've been having a little problem at the office recently and you know what? I think you can help me."

-

Ron Stoppable was a man on the run. Figuratively speaking of course. While he may have _liked_ to be about 400 miles away from his home right now, several things (the least of which was not the fact that his scooter would never make it) had conspired to keep him firmly rooted in place. So instead of being on the lamb and enjoying relative freedom, he was huddled up in his fathers first floor study, hunched over an ancient P.C. and doing the one thing that he dreaded most of all.

Homework.

The reason for this auspicious occasion was two fold – he really did need to get this report done for Mr. Barkin's history class and secondly, he really, _really_ didn't want to go to sleep.

"_Actually sleep would be pretty good right now – I'm kind of frazzled. It's all the __**other**__ stuff that has me scared shitless._"

Ron would never be accused of being a super genius, but even someone of his admittedly modest intellectual capabilities ought to have seen the predicament coming a mile away instead of merrily walking right into her little trap.

"_I knew she was devious, but this goes beyond that – she's actually using my own hormones against me!_"

It had happened sometime after dinner. Ron had retired to his room to try out the _Nakasumi 3000_ game center that had found its way into his newly remodeled room. At first he had merely looked at the system, basking in it's hi-tech geeky glory the way a sun worshiper might gawk at the sun. But eventually the anticipation became too much for him to ignore and he started to study the vast array of game titles that Yori had procured for him, wondering which one of these timeless classics would be the first to bust his HD-ultimate gaming cherry.

At the time he didn't realize how ironic that sentiment would be.

About a half hour into his new gaming experience he felt a body sit next to him – he glanced away from the array of carnage on the high definition television screen and saw Yori, sitting politely to his side and smiling. Ron, slightly high on a videogame induced endorphin rush forgot for a moment that he was supposed to be petrified said "Hi" and returned her smile without realizing the opening he had left.

"Hello _Danna-sama_," Yori said as she inched closer to Ron's sitting form. He was trying to stare very intently at the game he was playing, hoping that if he was able to look right through the screen than perhaps it would take his mind off the fact that Yori, with her lithe body and wonderful smell was just a scant few inches away from him.

"Um… uh… Wanna play a game?" Ron asked in a nervous voice.

He didn't know how he did it, perhaps he had some sort of super human power that he had never noticed before, but he actually _felt_ Yori staring at him with a passionate heat that defied any previous experience Ron had ever had with the fairer sex. It made his skin flush, his heart race and his knees weak. It was over all, a good thing he was sitting down as well – otherwise things might have gotten _very interesting_ rather quickly if Yori had noticed his…

Well, enough of that.

Anyway, it was in this supremely agitated state that Ron discovered the most uncomfortable thing about his new (and supposedly temporary) living arraignment when Yori whispered in his ear.

"Let's go to bed."

Ron's thumbs slammed down on the controller as he tried desperately to work the tension out of _some_ parts of his body into his fingers and out through the game controller.

"Uh… I'm not really tired right now. And uh… Wait! Where are we going to sleep?" Ron asked, suddenly realizing a key piece of information that had escaped him all evening.

"Right here _bakka_!" Yori giggled and motioned behind her.

Ron took note that the only thing that lay in the direction that Yori had pointed at was the rather large (and he ruefully admitted, comfortable looking) bed that had just recently been moved into the room. Quickly he bolted upright and then turned to face the door.

"I'll be right back!" he said.

"Wait, where are you going Ron-kun?" asked Yori in a sweet, pleading voice.

"I have some camping stuff in the garage so I'm going to go look for my sleeping bag."

"But Ron-kun, we have plenty of blankets. Why do we need a sleeping bag?"

The struggle that waged inside the mortal body of Ron Stoppable at that moment in time was so profound that words do not exist to properly catalogue the forces that were at work. His brain felt like it was melting and his body, already excited, was starting to reach levels that approximated "complete and total loss of control". If Yori had been a little more devious, or a little more suggestive then it was highly likely that she would have won her battle then and there – however she innocently had hesitated, not comprehending that Ron actually _wouldn't_ want to share a bed with her, and because of this Ron's heart was able to reassert itself and the love that he harbored in there for Kim managed to do the one thing that it could do to save him.

He ran for it.

"I just remembered! I have a history paper due tomorrow!" Ron called over his shoulder as he ran down the stairs and bolted into his fathers study. Quickly he closed the door and locked it behind him and then he put his back to the door and slowly slid down its vertical surface until he was on his haunches.

"_Self control Ron. It's all about self control. Think of Kim. If you can't handle this Ron then how are you going to be good enough for KP? She deserves better than that man… Head in the game Stoppable!_"

Now however Ron had been locked in the study for over an hour and while it was true that he had a history paper to write, he hadn't had _that much_ of a history paper to write. And even if he did, it was highly unlikely that Yori would merely let him stay in the study all evening. He needed a way out, some way to avoid going back into that room. He needed some sort of plan…

All thoughts of scheming and plotting flew out of Ron's head when he heard the door bell ring. Ron unlocked the study door and peeked his head out. Not finding anyone in the foyer, he crept (why was he creeping in his own house?) to the front door and carefully opened it.

"Kim?" Ron said in surprise. It wasn't like Kim to show up at his house so late unannounced, and after the way she had reacted at lunch today… Well, Ron wasn't so sure that she was going to be talking to him for a few days. He was glad that it seemed like he was wrong.

"Hi Ron!" said Kim, "I just came over to… apologize."

"Huh? What for KP?" Ron asked in all seriousness.

"_That's so like Ron. I almost cold-cock him in the cafeteria and he doesn't even think I did anything wrong. This guy… Well, I guess that's why I… um… er I mean – he's my best friend._"

"Ron! For practically slapping your cheek through your mouth today! What do you think?" Kim said.

"Oh… _that_," Ron said. It wasn't that he was trying to be magnamous about the whole thing, it was just with all the excitement that had happened since he had gotten home he had quite literally forgotten all about it.

"It's ok KP!" Ron said.

It probably really _wasn't_ ok – but Ron didn't mind all that much. He was just glad Kim was here – all he'd have to do know is explain the situation to her and then let her do her magic. If anyone could fix it, Ron was certain that Kim could.

"Ron, it's so totally _not_ ok!" Kim responded, "You're my best friend and I should know that you wouldn't be such a jerk as to do something like… well, you _know_. Like _that._"

Ron nodded piously. This was _exactly_ what he had been talking about. Kim would fix everything, he knew it.

"I mean I was a little shocked when Yori said all that stuff."

"What 'stuff' did I say Possible-san?" came the chilling voice from behind Ron's back.

"Y-Y-Yori!" he stammered , springing to the side of the door jam and slightly turning backwards in the direction that the voice had come from.

There, standing at the bottom of the stairway, was Yori. She had evidently heard the voices and had decided to come and investigate who was talking to Ron at such a late evening hour. At first she was just going to call down the stairs, but when she heard Kim's voice she had another idea and instead decided to just walk to the foyer dressed exactly how she was.

Which is to say, not very dressed at all.

Her silk black hair was down and it hung on her shoulders like inky pools of shining darkness – the contrast with her skin was amazing in the light coming through the open door. She had also changed her clothes, Ron wasn't sure when she had done that, but instead of her previous outfit of t-shirt and shorts, she was now wearing a very revealing and sheer white number that clung to and hugged her body in all the right ways. Ron tried not to look but he couldn't help it – the material was so thin it left little to the imagination and Ron got more than an eyeful of Yori's special delights.

"Yori!" screamed Kim in utter shock.

"What are _you_ doing here!" she continued, and then turning to Ron she said, "Ron? What is _she_ doing here? Spill! Now!"

"About that…" Ron began to explain, only to be cut off by Yori.

"I live here Possible-san. Ron-kun is my husband! And as to what I am doing? I was waiting upstairs in _our bed_ for Ron-kun to come up and fulfill his husbandly duties!" Yori spat this phrase at Kim like she was a cobra hurling venom at a victim.

Some part of Ron's brain knew what was about to happen right before it did and offered him a couple of choices – take it, or dodge. He wasn't sure exactly _when_ or even _why_ he had come to his decision, but on his own accord he took two steps forward and walked directly into one of the most devastating uppercuts known to man.

"RON! YOU PIG!" shouted Kim at the top of her lungs as her fist connected with the slightly pudgy jaw-line of Ron Stoppable.

Kim was instantly horrified at what she had done – she didn't know why the she had gotten so angry, or why it was directed at Ron, or even why right now when she was feeling guilty for decking him again, she was dealing with a new emotion that welled up deep inside her and started to make her cry.

"_What's this? What's happening to me?"_

Ron for his part inwardly smiled at the way events had turned out. He had been worried, deathly worried, that he would crack under the constant barrage of attention fromYori and break the secret promise for Kim that he had cared in his heart for so long now.

However, as Kim's fist connected with his jaw and darkness came over him he was relieved that he at least didn't have to worry about it right now.

"_I knew I could count on you KP – problem solved!_"

These were his last thoughts right before he flew backwards and lost consciousness.

-

A/N:

Well thank you again for reading this far. I had a little trouble with this chapter, but once I got to a certain part it started to flow pretty good. I really need to get more sleep; I think the lack of dormancy is affecting my creative juices!

I'm pretty happy with this chapter – There is only one real major plot development that happened here, but it was a **huge** one that's going to figure prominently in the upcoming chapters. I'm sure most of you can spot what it was.

Anyway, once again – Thank you for reading and for reviewing! It's the only payment I get and you guys have been great so far with ante'in up. I'm really looking forward to releasing the next chapter but I'm not giving away any spoilers!

Peace

QC


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7 – Stuck between a Rockwaller and a hard place

-

Ron Stoppable slumped down against the wall, catched his breath and finally took notice of his surroundings. He was somewhere in the school, from the looks of it an empty hallway that was seldom used – it was his oasis in the middle of a storm. He knew that skipping class wouldn't help his already tenuous grade point average but he was at a loss of what to do; It seemed like everywhere he went today he was either dodging an overly amorous Yori or a disgruntled Kim and as bad as school was, his home life was even more hazardous. For some reason his parent's had turned a blind eye to the fact that their teenage son was sharing a room with a beautiful girl that was more than _little_ interested in him which made simple tasks such as taking a shower an enterprise fraught with peril.

"_I need to see about putting a better lock on that door…_"

He knew it was fruitless, Yori _was_ an accomplished ninja and pretty much anything short of a one-way deadbolt would just be an inconvenience for her but he had to do something. If things kept going on the way that they had been, he knew that eventually he would give in to temptation and Yori could be quite tempting when she wanted to be.

Ron had idly wondered if it would be _so bad_ to give in to her. She was beautiful, no – down right gorgeous. She was sweet, deferential to his wishes in most things (except for his "no touchie" policy) and all around about as perfect of a girlfriend that you could wish for. The problem was of course, that she didn't want to be a girlfriend, but his wife.

And that scared the living hell out of him.

It wasn't just the fact that Ron felt that he was too young to get married, although he was. It was that despite how much he _liked_ Yori, he just didn't _love_ her and while he knew that it was possible that he _could_ fall for her, it hadn't happened yet and things were moving way too fast for his liking. And of course what Yori had told him last night hadn't helped calm his nerves.

"_Ron-kun, I need to produce an heir._"

Ron liked kids, he had even pondered briefly what it would be like to be a father, but he didn't like the idea of being one at the age of 16. He could literally feel the imminent responsibility crushing his soul like a mountain and Ron Stoppable wasn't a guy who dealt with responsibility well. The idea of having a wife and kids before he had even graduated high school was something that had never occurred to him before – and he liked it that way.

Compounding his problems was the fact that his best friend, and coincidentally, major crush interest, was furious at him. It wasn't that Ron didn't understand why Kim would be angry over the events of the last 24 hours, it was just that he couldn't comprehend why she was so downright _pissed_ at him. He had explained the sitch to her to the best of his ability, and while it appeared that Kim mostly believed him, whenever Yori was around her attitude took a serious turn for the worse.

If Ron had been a little bit better with the ladies, he probably would have realized why.

Be that as it may, Ron was more than a little confused with the behavior of his long time best friend. Still, he held out hope that eventually Kim would calm down and the two of them would be able to patch things up – if not for the sake of their friendship, then because Ron _desperately_ needed her help to get out of the trouble he was in.

"_She can do anything right? Like rescuing her best friend from imminent fatherhood…_"

All of these concerns were floating around Ron's head, but they were the least of his immediate problems. No, the greatest and most fearful thing that he would have to face today could be summed up in two words – Bonnie Rockwaller.

He had known that the stormy brunette was out to get him ever since he caught the withering glances that she had shot his way the day before and it wasn't like Ron could blame her – it was pretty much all his fault anyway. Ever since the fateful encounter in the closet he knew that his misspoken words were going to come back to haunt him, he just never counted on what form that the karmic revenge would take.

It had happened in his last period – Mr. Barkin's history class. Ron had (for once) actually finished his report on time and due to his desire to avoid a "night time" encounter with Yori had actually devoted enough time to his work to get a decent grade. After reading his findings to the class he had rather smugly walked back to his desk and sat down, his mood having improved dramatically for the first time since the previous day. Unfortunately for Ron, it wasn't about to last.

The class was winding down and Mr. Barkin rose from his desk and announced a _new_ project for the class. It would be their final assignment for the year and figure greatly into their grade. Ron, who had been struggling with this class, felt his good mood evaporate at the news.

"_It's ok – he said we could partner up, I'll just get Kim to be my partner and that way I won't have to worry about failing and being held back a year._"

It was a good plan and one that Ron had relied on before. It might have seemed like he was taking advantage of Kim's superior scholastic aptitude, but the truth of the matter was that Kim never let Ron slack off as much as someone else might have, so he _did_ in fact always manage to contribute quite a great deal of work. It had never occurred to Ron but in his effort to boost his grades by relying upon Kim, he had actually managed to get far more _learning_ in than he probably would have liked.

Despite the fact that Kim had been pretty steamed at him the night before, Ron felt pretty confident that she wouldn't ditch him on this assignment. Sure, she might be mad at him now but that had never stopped Kim from coming through for Ron when he needed her.

"So, KP… what topic do you want to do for the report?" he asked.

Kim looked at Ron and bluntly stated, "I don't know – I think I'm going to let my _boyfriend_ decide."

Upon hearing the word _boyfriend_ Ron's face fell. He had forgotten! Forgotten that Barkin's history class was one of the few classes that Kim and Eric shared. Normally Ron might have been able to plead with Kim to take him as a partner, but with the way things had been going…

Ron put his head down on his desk and resigned himself to being a Junior again next year.

"Stoppable," came the caustic sounding voice that snapped Ron out of his self-imposed desk-exile.

Ron raised his head and found himself staring into the eyes of the absolute last person he wanted to deal with today – Bonnie Rockwaller.

"You're my report partner Stoppable," she stated in a neutral tone.

"Huh? What?" exclaimed Ron, "What about Tara…" he looked around for the petite blonde girl.

"She's partnered with Justine," was all Bonnie said.

"_Oh God, this is it – she set me up, she's going to torture me over the next month non stop until I go insane and throw myself off a bridge._"

"But what about – " Ron started to say, but was cut off by Bonnie.

"Save it Stoppable. You're my partner and that's that," she growled at him.

Ron sighed and gave up in defeat. He did take a small measure of comfort from the fact that if he somehow, by the grace of God, managed to survive the duration of their working relationship he was at least guaranteed to pass this year. It was a small thing but at this point Ron was flailing recklessly for any semblance of good news.

"So, what topic do you want to do?" asked Ron, his voice fraught with trepidation.

"I'll tell you when you come over to my house tonight," Bonnie responded and then she turned on her heel and walked right out of the classroom.

"_I'm doomed,_" he thought to himself.

Ron knew that he had made a terrible error in judgment by not coming clean to Bonnie the moment that she confessed her feelings to him at Bueno Nacho. He had tried to rationalize his indecision at the time by claiming that he had been in both equal measures surprised and shocked and then later when he had time to collect his thoughts he had still foolishly proceeded onwards – justifying it this time by saying he was doing it for the sake of Bonnie's feelings. It didn't take a rocket scientist to notice that Bonnie Rockwaller was quite possibly the unhappiest and highest-strung girl in the entire school and for some reason Ron had stupidly thought that _he_ of all people could help her.

His kindness was always his undoing.

Of course there was another reason, one that Ron hadn't really wanted to think about because it was so deeply ingrained and hidden in his heart that it would be painful for him to examine at this time. It was a feeling that he had pretty much discarded in favor of slightly more realistic expectations and his burgeoning love obsession with his best friend, but the truth still remained –

Bonnie Rockwaller had been his _first_ crush.

-

It had started in middle school, the 7th grade to be exact. He had noticed Bonnie across a crowded hallway and he found his eyes irresistibly drawn to her. Ron had been having these _feelings_ recently; feelings that he had no explanation for and that had caused him no small amount of embarrassment. Just the other day in fact he had been wrestling around with Kim in her backyard when suddenly one of those _feelings _had surfaced, forcing him to run all the way home where he had locked himself in the bathroom with the Victoria's Secret catalogue for 10 minutes.

Thankfully neither of his parents had been around.

Now however, when he looked at Bonnie those feelings came back with a vengeance and they were like electricity tingling every nerve in his body. He felt his stomach do a flip and his skin flush as his body temperature started to rise. He knew that he wasn't the most popular or funniest or handsome guy in the school, but for a moment he forgot all that and walked across the hall to introduce himself to her. The result was not what most people would have thought.

"Hi there! I'm Ron, Ron Stoppable – you're new here aren't you?" he had asked with a big smile.

Bonnie seemed to pause for a moment, pondering what she should say. Eventually she spoke, "I just transferred here this year. I'm…"

"Bonnie Rockwaller. I know – I've seen you hanging with the cheer squad" he smiled back.

"You're totally badical!"

Bonnie unconsciously broke out in a smile. She was still feeling a little unsure about herself - having just recently arrived at this school. She missed her old friends from last year and her familiar surroundings, but she had been determined to make a go of it, so one of the first things she had done was try out for the cheer squad.

She was a natural, so of course she got it and to make it even sweeter she had so impressed the coach that the woman had put her in charge of the tryouts for the new cheerleaders. Bonnie was quite proud of herself.

"Uhm… Thanks…Ron?" she was a little flustered so she had forgotten his name. Ron was one of the few people this week that had come up to talk to her and she wondered if she was perhaps getting a little rusty.

"You know what? My friend Kim is thinking about trying out for the squad, what do you think about that?"

Bonnie's ears perked up – the team actually _did_ need a couple more members. While they weren't in danger of losing their spot in the school budget, if they didn't manage to round up a few more girls then they'd likely not be able to compete…

"I'd tell her to go for it! We actually could use a couple more girls. What did you say her name was again?"

"Kim – Kim Possible. We're best friends, since Pre-K."

Bonnie made a soft "hmm" noise as she tried to think where she had heard that name before. She was still new to the school and she hadn't met a lot of people yet, but for some reason Ron's friend's name rang a bell.

"Where do I know that name from?" Bonnie finally asked.

"KP? Er… I mean Kim? She's pretty popular you know…"

It was a lame attempt by Ron to hitch his star onto Kim's in the eyes of this girl, but he had been making such good progress that he went for it. Unlike a lot of the girls at the school, this one was actually talking to him and Ron decided that if mentioning Kim would help him get a date… Well, Kim would understand.

Bonnie nodded at Ron, "That must be it, I've probably heard her name before…"

"Would you like to meet her? She's having a birthday party this week and um… I can invite you if you want."

Bonnie was surprised by how fast she said, "Yes!" She didn't know if it was because she wanted to fit in to her new school so badly, or if because she was excited that a boy from school was talking to her. It wasn't that boys didn't like her, at least not at her old school, but it seemed for some reason that recently they'd been avoiding her…

Of course, being not quite a teenager Bonnie didn't realize the reason was because they were all intimidated by her beauty.

There was a loud ringing and the two young people looked up in dismay as the tardy bell rung out through the halls.

"Eep! Guess we gotta go huh? I'll talk to you later Bonnie and tell you about the party!_"_

Ron waved at the pretty girl as he hurried on to his class. He had been feeling pretty darn good about himself and when he rounded the corner he made sure Bonnie couldn't see him and then proceeded to let out a loud, "Booyah!"

Bonnie Rockwaller heard it and giggled.

-

Of course, that was then and this was now and a heck of a lot of things had changed along the way. He couldn't say for certain what had happened, but he knew that his tenuous relationship with Bonnie had taken a turn for the worse the evening of Kim's birthday party. He tried to remember back to then…

-

"So, what do you think Bonnie? Cool party huh?" Ron said as he gestured around the room.

Kim's parents had turned their basement into an impromptu dance club for the day, even going so far as to install some party lighting and moving her dads near ancient, but powerful, college era stereo system downstairs. Kim had invited most of her class to the party and being as popular as she was, pretty much everyone showed up. The basement was hot and the air was thick with the sounds of music blasting off the walls as well as the heat burning off the dancing kids.

Bonnie had to admit, it was a pretty rocking party.

"It's awesome Ron! Thanks for inviting me!" Bonnie said as she put her drink down on the long fold out table that was serving as the "refreshment center" for the pre-teens.

The song that had been playing suddenly ended and there was a brief pause until the next song started. Ron took the opportunity to bend over and whisper something in Bonnie's ear, "I'm really glad you could come. I've been looking forward to this all week."

Bonnie blushed and smiled at Ron. She was too shy to say anything at this point, but she had been eagerly anticipating this day as well. True, she didn't know Ron's friend that well, but she figured anyone who was friends with such a sweet guy was probably really nice.

Suddenly the music started up again and the familiar strains of the _Oh Boyz_ started playing. Ron grabbed Bonnie's hand and motioned towards the makeshift dance floor. She smiled at him and followed him through the small crowd of partygoers. Bonnie let the music wash over her and she began to move her arms and legs, twisting her hips to the beat. Ron wasn't that great of a dancer she mused, but he was enthusiastic and when he caught her looking at him she could tell that he purposely exaggerated his movements to make her laugh.

Bonnie didn't know when it had started, but she knew that she felt something special for this boy – in fact, she was pretty sure that she was seriously crushing on him. It was exciting and a little bit scary at the same time. She had never had a boyfriend before, but she supposed that was to be expected at her age. Just thinking about it, thinking about _him_ made her stomach fill with butterflies – it was an alien but euphoric feeling.

The music slowly ground to a halt and before the next dance could begin Bonnie excused herself to go upstairs to the bathroom. She didn't really need to go all that badly, but it was hot in the basement and she had been sweating and she really didn't want to dance all that close to Ron if she was going to be all… "glisteny" – it just wouldn't look good. With a quick look over her shoulder and a wave, Bonnie bounced up the basement stairs to the first floor bathroom.

Right as she was coming through the door she accidentally bumped into another party guest.

"Oh! Sorry!" she exclaimed, reaching down to help the other girl up.

The poor girl had fallen directly on her own bottom and she looked a little stunned. She reached up and accepted Bonnie's hand and then said, "Hey, you're Bonnie Rockwaller, aren't you?"

Bonnie grunted a little bit while she helped hoist the other girl up and then replied, "Yep!"

"Hi, I'm Tara – I auditioned for the cheer team this week…" she let her voice trail off.

"I know!_"_ said Bonnie, "You did really good by the way! You're totally going to get on the team!"

It was the truth, the petite blonde girl had shown a great deal of gymnastic aptitude, which of course was essential for the cheer club, but it was the interview segment that really cinched it – she had such a naturally sunny personality that everyone found irresistible. The coach hadn't announced the final line-up yet, but Bonnie was sure that Tara was going to be in it.

"Really? Awesome!" Tara bounced up on the balls of her feet and clapped her hands together; she had been pretty worried about making the cut.

"Hey! Didn't you come here with Ron?" she asked.

Bonnie blushed and nodded.

"Wow, everyone is talking about that – we're all so shocked!"

Bonnie blinked… was this girl insinuating that she shouldn't be with Ron? Despite how nice Tara seemed, if that was the way she was going to go… Well, Bonnie would just have to scratch her off her potential friends list.

"What's so shocking?" she asked with a serious tone.

Tara caught the vibe that Bonnie was giving off and immediately understood that the brunette had misunderstood her.

"Nothing! It's just… Kim and Ron, y'know?" Tara responded.

Bonnie wondered what there was to know. Did Tara know something she didn't? Ron had only said that Kim was his best friend…

"They're best friends?" Bonnie ventured.

"Well, yeah I guess so… it's just that… hmm, how do I say this?" Tara seemed to pause for a moment and ponder her next choice of words.

"There was a rumor going around…" Tara lowered her voice and tried to whisper in Bonnie's ear.

"… that Kim was secretly crushing on her best friend."

"Best friend? Wait you mean… Ron?" asked Bonnie.

Tara nodded sagely.

"It was just a rumor I guess" she added.

Even if it was just a rumor Bonnie didn't like it – not one bit. She was pretty sure that Ron wasn't the type of guy to "_double-deal_" and just the thought of it made her stomach do an unhealthy flip.

"_Ugh, I guess I know how mom feels…_" Bonnie thought to herself, but then quickly banished the notion – she was here to have fun, not to dwell on her parent's marital problems.

"Well, I'm going to get back to the party – see ya Bonnie!" chirped Tara as she walked past Bonnie and descended the stairs to the basement.

For some reason Bonnie had the urge to follow her – she didn't like the fact that she was so sweaty and she was worried that Ron would think she was a pig, but at the same time she was overcome by a sudden urge to just _see him_. Bonnie didn't realize it but the problems that her parents were having had fostered a great deal of insecurity within her heart, and it was on this emotion that she acted.

Bonnie's hand gently glided down the side railing as she bounced down the basement stairs. The music was really, really loud and there were still quite a few kids down here, moving and dancing around to the beats. She scanned the small crowd for Ron, but in the strange lights and with the mass of bodies she couldn't find him right away. A small kernel of doubt took root in her brain and she felt a sickening feeling begin to bloom in her stomach.

"_Where is he?_"

Bonnie pushed past a few people on the dance floor, trying to make her way to the opposite side of the room. She had just shouldered past a dancing couple when she finally found Ron.

He was kissing Kim Possible.

For the first time, and the last time as well, Bonnie Rockwaller ran from a room full of people in tears. The girl from earlier, Tara, had seen her and tried to reach out for her, but she brushed off her hand and sprinted up the stairs and out of the house.

"_Why? Why did he do that? I really liked him! I really did!_" she lamented.

She was sobbing now and it became harder for her to keep running, so she slowed down to a brisk walk, using her hands to wipe away the tears that wouldn't stop flowing from her eyes.

"_Why do you have to ask such dumb questions Bonnie?_" she shouted at herself.

"_Of course he'd like that girl better – she's pretty and smart and popular and everyone thinks she's great. What do you have, huh? Nothing! That's what! It's just like Connie and Lonnie always say – They got the looks and the brains and you got what's left over!_"

Bonnie slowed down her walk because she was crying so hard that she couldn't' see straight. She found herself leaning against the trunk of a large tree, her face buried in one of her arms. She made a fist with her other hand and then started to pound on the tree, using each pummeling blow to emphasize yet another put-down or flaw that she believed about her self.

"_It's not fair! Why do I take after mom? I __**hate**__ her! She's so dumb and useless, it's no wonder Daddy left her for…_"

Bonnie didn't finish that thought. She didn't like thinking about it that way. Besides, it was her mother's fault – it _had_ to be her mother's fault. She had pushed her father away somehow, maybe by being not good enough for him, or not smart enough, or not pretty enough…

"_Just like me…_"

It was hard for Bonnie _not_ to draw parallels between what had just happened and her own family situation. She was so consumed with self-loathing and insecurity that she felt like her body was just going to fold up on itself, completely collapsing into the _nothing_ that she really was.

As much as she had wanted it, her body simply refused to disappear – leaving Bonnie to deal with the painful emotional feelings that were coursing through her heart. She didn't know what to do, or who to talk to. She couldn't reach out to anyone, at least not anyone in her family – they would either alternatively, ignore her, ridicule her, or psycho-analyze her, and none of those options held any appeal.

Bonnie pushed her body away from the tree and dusted her self off. She was still upset, still slightly crying, but a little bit more in control of her feelings. She started walking down the street towards her house - it was getting dark and she really should have called to have one of her parents pick her up. Still, Middleton (at this time) was still pretty safe and Bonnie didn't worry too much about it.

The moon had just come out a few minutes ago and she walked with her head cocked to the side so that she could watch it. She didn't know why, but it made her feel better to watch its luminescent glow fill the sky. Eventually most of the drama had worked its way out of her immediate system and Bonnie was left to just plod along down the street, staring at the night sky and wondering what she should do. She knew instinctively that she had to make some sort of change in her life or all the abuse and pressure she felt was going to crush her.

She darkly thought that if she experienced anything like this again, that it might even kill her.

Yes, a change was in order. She hated the fact that she was her mother's daughter. She hated the fact that she shared that woman's same weaknesses. She hated who she was.

So, she decided, she would just become someone else. Someone who didn't let people hurt them. Someone who didn't care enough to get hurt in the first place. Someone who didn't get used, but instead… used people.

Someone like her dad.

Her father had been telling her most of her life that she was a Rockwaller and what that meant. Bonnie just simply decided to start _believing _it. After all, it had worked for him – she sincerely doubted that her father had ever gotten played like she just had.

Bonnie snorted when she thought about it.

"_Who does he think he is to do that to me? Hell! Who does __**she**__ think she is? That stupid little brace-face tin-teeth date stealer. She thinks she's going to try out for the cheer squad huh? Well I'll show her – I'll make her do a routine that is so impossible that she'll fail and totally embarrass herself._"

Tonight Bonnie Rockwaller might be licking her wounds, but tomorrow she was determined that she was going to come out with both guns blazing. There'd be no more nights like to night _ever_ and she was going to prove a point – never mess with a Rockwaller.

-

"C'mon Kim get it out!" whined Ron as he tried valiantly to keep from grabbing at his own eye.

Kim was leaning forward, her face dangerously close to Ron's.

"Ron! It's so dark in here I can barely see! How did you do this anyway?" Kim asked.

She grabbed Ron's head and tried to angle his face towards the light so she could see better, but it wasn't really helping much.

"You know those little champagne cork fireworks? I was looking at one… You know, just trying to figure out how it worked…"

Kim rolled her eyes, "and let me guess, you 'accidentally' pulled the string?"

Ron arched the eyebrow above his one good eye and then said flatly, "You were watching, weren't you?"

"Ron!" Kim said with an exasperated tone.

"Seriously KP, it feels like my eyeball's on fire!"

"Ron, I don't think I'm going to get this – Let's go upstairs and ask my Mom to do it"

Ron sighed. The last thing he wanted his date to see was his best friend's mom washing his eye out with water while he did his best not to look like a complete wuss.

"I guess so… but one thing KP…"

"Yes?"

"Lay off the jalapeño poppers." Ron said with real disgust in his voice.

"Ron!"

"I'm serious, it smells gorchy and you're getting the cream cheese stuck in your braces. You don't want Walter Nelson to see you like that do you?" Ron smirked.

"Oh please! Walter and I are soooo over. He went around bragging to everyone that we 'quote, totally made out, end quote'. He's lucky that he transferred to West Side this year or he'd be wearing his braces around his teeth after I was done with him!"

On impulse Ron turned away from Kim and looked around through the crowd for a few seconds and then tapped a dancing girl on the shoulder.

"Hey, have you seen Bonnie Rockwaller?" he asked.

The girl shrugged, "She was here a few seconds ago, but then she ran upstairs."

"That's odd…" Ron said out loud.

"What's odd Ron? Asides from you that is…" Kim grinned at him.

"Ha ha. Good one Kim. Seriously, did you stay up all night working on that?" he responded.

Kim feigned a punch at Ron's shoulder and rolled her eyes.

"Sorry, just a little tweaked I guess. I'm going to go look for your mom and then look for Bonnie. If you see her, let her know what happened…. But Kim?" Ron asked.

"Yes?"

"Try to make it sound… um, more 'manly' or something. Ok?" he begged.

Kim laughed and nodded at Ron, shooing him away and up the stairs.

Mrs. Dr. P _was_ able to provide the dire medical attention that Ron needed that night, but unfortunately for Ron his date couldn't be found. No one had seen her leave the party and she hadn't talked to anyone about leaving.

"_Should I call her? Maybe she dumped me? Heh… we'd have to be going out first to get dumped. Hmm, maybe we __**were**__ going out – It was kind of a date, wasn't it? Girls are confusing…_"

Ron decided that he should check up on Bonnie (even if she had dumped him) and he got her phone number from the school directory. A few seconds later he was sitting back on the family room couch and listening to the ring through the handset.

"Rockwaller residence," a voice said on the end of the line.

"Hello! Is Bonnie there?" Ron asked.

There was a pause.

"This is Bonnie…"

Ron held the handset to his left and cleared this throat, then began to speak.

"Hi Bonnie this is Ron, I was just wond – "

"Don't you ever call me again you _loser!_" came the instant retort over the phone line, followed by the sound of the receiver slamming down and then the signal dropping.

"I guess that settles that," Ron said to him self as he tossed his body back down on to the couch.

"Ron Stoppable, consider yourself dumped!"

-

Ron remembered that the days that followed after that were pretty unpleasant. Bonnie, who had seemed so sweet to him at first, had done a complete 180 on him. Every time he tried to talk to her, she verbally dressed him down. If she saw him passing in the hall, she would rag on him or mock him in some way. Ron couldn't believe it, but he could actually feel his feeble popularity dropping like a rock as Bonnie continued to heap scorn upon him and he flatly refused to respond in kind. Ron Stoppable just wasn't that kind of guy.

There was a time however when he did almost lose his cool – Kim had wanted to try out for the cheer squad and somehow Bonnie had been the one to decide what routine she would have to do. Ron took one look at it and knew that it had been designed to make Kim fail and embarrass her in front of the other girls. It was with a huge sense of relief that Kim had actually managed to complete the routine (she was the girl who could do anything, after all) and a great deal of sadness that Bonnie would stoop so low as to bring Kim into their problems.

Ron had often thought that eventually Bonnie would outgrow whatever it was that was eating her up, but unfortunately for Ron he was wrong and Bonnie had actually carried that same attitude forward with her into high school. If anything, it was actually more caustic and refined. Indeed, her scathing remarks and put-downs burned with a laser like intensity.

Bonnie Rockwaller had pretty much mastered the art of bitchiness.

Ron sighed as the bell signaling the end of class rang and he knew that he needed to get going. It was nice for him to have a little break from the madness of the last couple of days, but if he kept this up he definitely would fail his junior year and that was a prospect he didn't really want to think about.

"_Maybe today I'll go Bueno Nacho after school. I'll blow the rest of my allowance for the week and have my 'last meal'._"

Ron wasn't usually so bleak, but he had good reason. In less than 5 hours he was going to be walking into the lions den and he wasn't sure he was going to escape intact.

"_Sigh, I don't even have time to run home and get my cup…_"

Ron winced in memory and then reluctantly shambled back to class.

-

A/N:

I think everyone knew this was coming sooner or later – the dreaded "Drama" chapter. Sorry folks but it had to be done (and I hope, it was done well) for the story to progress. Vigilant fans of the TV show will notice how while I fabricated a lot of the contents of this chapter, I did it keeping in mind Kim and Bonnie's first meeting as portrayed on the T.V. show – I just added a bit A.U. there to make the story work.

I'm pretty pleased with the way this chapter came out. I know we still have a lot of "Queen B" to deal with until we can get to the "good" parts, but at least you guys have a glimpse of the Bonnie that's laying under the surface and the reason why she's been buried so deep.

Once again, Thanks for reading and please review!

QC


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8 – Into the Lions Den.

-

Yori Stoppable (nee Matsumaru), last scion of the fabled Yamanouchi clan, crept silently from house to house stalking her prey. She had tracked him across the oceans of the globe to this seemingly placid mountain town and she was determined not to lose her quarry at this late stage.

Especially to the likes of Bonnie Rockwaller.

Logically Yori reasoned that she didn't have to worry – all of the intelligence that she had been able to gather as well as first hand experience pointed to the fact that Ron Stoppable and Bonnie Rockwaller had a relationship that went beyond bordering hostilities and delved into the realm of "all out war". More than one time during the last week Yori's patience with the woman had been tried – it seemed that she never passed up the opportunity to belittle or denigrate Ron and while Ron himself might shrug these comments off, or ignore them, they made Yori's blood boil.

"_How dare she mock the Chosen One? These American's are so ignorant, they turn a blind eye to greatness!_"

It was unlikely that Ron would have used such words to describe himself, yet Yori knew that the _Chosen One_ was only unaware; ignorant of his place in history and the honor that would be his to claim. Honor, coincidentally, that Yori was determined to direct towards the Yamanouchi Clan.

"_Grandfather is right. Our people's blood grows thin, our sacred arts, our teachings, they are all fading into the night – our very heritage is passing beyond the veil._"

Yori looked longingly at the blonde haired young man walking under the tree shaded lane.

"_But with him, this does not need to be our fate. If the bloodline of the Chosen One can be added to the Yamanouchi, then we could once again be the noblest of all ninja families!_"

Yori allowed a girlish flush to creep across her face as she imagined the glory of her house and ancestral lands restored – together she and the _Chosen One_ would reclaim the honor of the Yamanouchi Clan, together they would raise a new generation of ninja leaders and establish the dominance of the Yamanouchi School and art for generations to come.

Her heart fluttered at the thought of her being able to teach the secret arts that had been handed down to her to a new generation of perfect ninjas. She had never been surer of anything in her life that _this_ was her destiny. All her plans seemed to be falling into place, except for one niggling thing –

Ron Stoppable kept avoiding her!

At first she wrote off his reluctance to consummate their "marriage" due to his inexperience and shyness. She had merely resolved to redouble her efforts at seduction in order to overcome his sense of modesty. She had worn skimpy outfits, brushed up against him sensuously and made sure to habitually "drop" her towel whenever she came out of the shower – yet it was all for naught. If Yori hadn't known any better she would have thought herself to be either the most hideous woman in the world, or Ron to be gay.

It was frustrating, in so many excruciating ways.

"_Ron-kun is a good man, the only reason why he would refuse me so much must be because…_"

Yori didn't like to think about it, but she was fairly certain at this point that the _Chosen One's_ heart belonged to another. If only she could figure out _who_ it was exactly, then she could at least formulate some plan of attack to get the other girl out of the way, but as it was Ron was keeping his cards close to his chest.

This was the reason why, despite the incredulity of the possibility, Yori was trailing Ron to the home of Bonnie Rockwaller. It was, in her mind, highly unlikely that Ron was harboring a secret crush for the woman, especially given the way she took pleasure in publicly grinding him beneath her heel, but at this point she was willing to entertain the idea. If anything, her espionage attempts today would allow her to hopefully rule Bonnie out of the list of candidates for Ron's heart and if not… well, then she could make _plans_.

Yori peeked out from around a low fence and watched Ron walk up to a large lone house at the end of a cul-de-sac. He seemed to hesitate for a moment, looking around as if either there was anyone around to see him, or possibly, to save him, and then slowly walked up the long stone path to the front door. Yori remained in her hiding place and watched the door open up, revealing the silhouetted figure of a young woman, some words were exchanged and then Ron entered the house.

"_Hmm, there must be a place around here where I can spy a little bit. I could try to enter the house unseen, but it is likely that the Chosen One would detect me – he may not realize it but he is more perceptive than he believes._"

Yori paused for a moment, summing up her options, and then cautiously made her way to the outside of the Rockwaller house, taking cares to be both hidden and unheard.

-

Ron Stoppable felt sick to his stomach as he waited on the front porch of Bonnie Rockwaller's house. He'd been nervous, wary even, pretty much all day about what was going to happen tonight, but that paled to how he felt now. For some reason ever since he had left the high school he had this sense of foreboding that had nearly overwhelmed him and if anything it had intensified as he had come closer and closer to his destination.

"_Ugh… not only do I feel like I'm going to hurl but the hairs on the back of my neck are standing up. I swear someone's looking at me…_"

Ron just shrugged and reached for the ringer to the side of the door; it was unlikely that anyone would bother to track his movements, he was just literally that unimportant of a person/ His unpopularity had been his anonymity for most of his school career and he felt confidently cloaked in his own low social caste and while recent events had pushed him up a little higher on the food chain (being married to a hot girl tended to do that, even if Ron himself didn't consider it to be true), he was still at best, a "bottom runger".

Still, Ron secretly was enjoying the brief bout of fame he was currently experiencing. Everyone at school it seemed, was looking at him in a slightly different light and while this might under normal circumstances be something that he would have welcomed, the unfortunate side effect of his "marriage" was that his best friend since pre-K evidently thought he was either a pervert or a lout – he couldn't decide which one.

"_I need to square this away with Kim, one and for all before things get out of hand – she's already canceled Ron-night this week and we haven't had a mission in ages… if this doesn't change soon then I don't know what'll happen between us._"

As Ron was pondering his future with Kim, the door to house opened, revealing the backlit visage of Bonnie Rockwaller. Bonnie was, for all intents and purposes, a living vision of youthful beauty – despite what people might say about her personality, no one could deny the fact that at the very least the outside shell of Bonnie Rockwaller was a glorious thing to behold. Ron however, had a different opinion – he knew a secret about Bonnie that most people didn't know; Before there was the "Queen B", there was another girl at the helm of her ship and while she had seemed to have disappeared, recent events had made Ron wonder if perhaps she wasn't trying to make a resurgence.

"Stoppable," came the strained voice of Bonnie, "Don't just stand there like an idiot, come inside."

And with that Bonnie spun on her heel and retreated into the house.

"_Are you so sure about his Ron? Maybe Bueno Nacho was a fluke. Maybe Bonnie really __**is**__ this girl now, no matter how you remember her._"

Ron gathered up his nerves and followed Bonnie, gently closing the door behind him.

"So, um, Bonnie… What do you want to do about the project?" Ron offered feebly.

Bonnie just ignored him and kept walking. She reached the base of the stairs and started to ascend, then turned around once, barely looking at Ron, and beckoned him with her hand.

Ron sighed and followed again, the entire situation was getting beyond creepy. He felt like he was some obscure carnival performer who was tasked with waking on glass, juggling fire and balancing plates – all at the same time.

"_Well, at least I've learned one thing since I've been here – I've discovered hither to unknown new heights of anxiety. _"

All of a sudden Bonnie stopped at one of the doors on the second floor and turned the handle, opening the door and walked through. Ron waited outside in the hall, unsure as to if he was willing to enter the lions den. It was Bonnie's plaintive cry of "Come on!" that finally caused his feet to move again. With one last push to steel his nerves, Ron crossed the threshold into a place that he had only ever been to before once in his life – Bonnie Rockwaller's bedroom.

"Wow… I guess you really haven't changed it much since middle school" Ron said offhandedly.

Bonnie just glared at him in response.

"Sorry, just trying to make small talk" he said.

"Look Stoppable, I know you don't really want to be here but I… we have a job to do. If you can just manage to keep your weirdo comments to yourself for a couple hours we both might escape from this uncomfortable situation unharmed."

Ron meekly nodded at Bonnie and looks uncomfortably around the room.

"Ok then, how do we start?" he asked.

Bonnie gestured to a low coffee table that had several books already on it and then took a seat.

Ron stared at the table quizzically and then shrugged, moving to take a seat opposite of beautiful brunette.

"So Bonnie, can I ask you a weird question?"

Bonnie sighed, "Didn't I say to keep your weirdness to yourself?"

"Sorry! Just this one time, I swear!"

She rolled her eyes, "Go ahead…"

"Why did you bring this table up from your living room? I mean, couldn't we work on this downstairs…"

Ron was uncomfortable with being in a semi-secluded spot with Bonnie. He thought that perhaps if they could move downstairs someplace then maybe he might be "safe", or at least "safer" from whatever revenge Bonnie was going to visit upon him.

"My… sisters are coming home from college tonight. I didn't want to be disturbed," Bonnie's voice was tight when she said this and Ron suddenly remembered something.

"They don't still pick on you, do they?" he asked.

"What did I say about weird questions?" Bonnie growled at him.

Ron shrugged. He knew that Bonnie didn't have the best home life, in fact he had been present at Bonnie getting dressed down by her elder siblings the one and only time he had ever been over to the Rockwaller house. He had felt really bad for Bonnie – obviously she was trying to show off a little bit for Ron, and her sisters, Connie and Lonnie, had came down on her like a ton of bricks. They hadn't talked about it at the time but Bonnie looked like she was on the verge of tears.

"Sorry… You don't deserve that you know," he muttered softly.

Bonnie heard him, but she let it slide. She agreed with Ron, she didn't deserve it, but she didn't want to talk about it either – especially not to the _Loser_. He was the last person on the planet that she wanted even an ounce of pity from, not after what he had done to her. And besides, she had a job to do – one that she had promised her father she would undertake, even if she had found the idea rather unsettling. All she had to do was to get the study session rolling and then while Ron was distracted start subtly pumping him for information.

Bonnie slid a piece of paper across the table to Ron and then crossed her arms. "Pick one."

Ron looked down – it was the list of topics that Mr. Barkin had handed out earlier in class. He noticed that several of them had been crossed out already, evidently although Bonnie was willing to let him "choose" the topic, she had already narrowed down the choices. Ron's eyes filtered down the list until they stopped at one entry. It was crossed out and Ron wondered why.

"Why did you cross this one out?" he asked, curiosity in his tone.

"Which one?" asked Bonnie. She leaned over the table, her loose top hanging low and revealing her ample bust-line to Ron. He tried to look away – he wanted to be serious about this.

Bonnie saw the entry that Ron's finger was pointing to and then leaned back and shrugged.

"It's overdone. It's depressing and who wants to hear about _that_ all the time?" she stated disinterestedly.

Ron Stoppable was a pretty easy going guy most of the time, but there were a few things that set him off. Bonnie, unknowingly, had just pressed one of his major buttons. Unconsciously he screwed up his face and his voice dropped a whole octave as he replied.

"Well _I_, don't happen to agree Bonnie. I don't think it's overdone at all, in fact I think it's one of the most important events of the 20th century and frankly I think people need to be reminded about it so that it _never_ happens again."

There was an almost imperceptible change in the façade that Bonnie Rockwaller wore to mask her feelings. At first she was shocked – shocked that Ron would seemingly out of the blue show so much backbone, but then slowly the reason why began to dawn on her.

"I forgot. You're Jewish," she said softly.

"Two thirds," Ron replied in an even voice.

Bonnie puzzled at his response, what did he mean?

"You're two thirds Jewish?" she asked.

"No Bonnie, I mean I lost two thirds of my family in the holocaust, including both sets of Grandparents."

Bonnie didn't know how to take this news from Ron. He always seemed so… unconcerned, frivolous even and definitely not the serious type. She realized that her mouth was hanging open and then quickly snapped her jaw shut.

"_What do I say to that? Some wisecrack? Some put down? I can't do it…_"

Even though people might not have thought so, even Bonnie Rockwaller had a heart. She was momentarily surprised to find that a lot of the hatred she had born for Ron over the last few years had seemed to slowly evaporate when she looked into his face. His expression was a mixture of serious determination and melancholy grief and somewhere deep down inside it tugged at Bonnie. Sure, insulting Ron Stoppable had become something of a sport for her over the last few years, but if she had known… well no matter what people might think about her, she would never stoop _that_ low.

Bonnie tried to think of something to say, something appropriate for the situation, but was coming up blanks. Luckily, it was Ron who pressed the point.

"I think we should do this one Bonnie," he stated firmly.

Bonnie, still flustered and out of sorts, merely nodded at Ron in silent acquiescence. She felt very un-Bonnie-like at the moment and it showed in her body language – she looked almost pained for a moment as she felt for perhaps the first time both equal parts shame and guilt.

"_I… I… I need to get some air._"

Bonnie stood up and made for the door, "I'm going to get some drinks. I'll be right back," she called over her shoulder.

Ron looked at the space that Bonnie had occupied just moments before and as he stared silently, he began to feel his adrenaline starting to subside. Ron generally felt really uncomfortable whenever he got "serious" about nearly anything, and truthfully he was regretting getting so worked up in front of Bonnie. It was obvious because of the shock that she had reacted with that she hadn't really been trying to insinuate anything; she probably had completely forgotten Ron's heritage all together. It was an easy thing to do, the Stoppable's weren't particularly observant Jews, and Ron himself didn't usually keep Kosher (it was impossible due to his love of Bueno Nacho), but still all the same Ron counted himself amongst the people of Abraham.

"_Maybe I was a little intense there. When she comes back up I'll apologize and ask her what subject she would like to do; maybe we can compromise._"

Ron didn't know it, but down stairs a particular brunette was having a slightly similar thought.

"_Why do I feel so terrible about this? I didn't mean it that way… Two thirds, two thirds of his entire family… gone. _"

Bonnie's hands shook slightly as she tried to pour the contents of a two liter soda bottle into a couple of plastic mugs.

"_When I go back up there I should… apologize._"

Bonnie winced as she thought the word, still her guilt at her insensitive actions and the response they had provoked from Ron hung heavily over her head, forcing her to do something she hadn't done in a long time – consider how Ron Stoppable felt.

"_Why am I worrying so much about this – no one at school is going to know what goes on here, and Ron wouldn't even think of trying to hold it against me, why am I so upset?_"

The answer of course was one that Bonnie wasn't entirely able to face or to admit to, at least right at this moment, but deep down inside she knew the truth; the little girl that lived deep down inside her had been hurt once, terribly so, and had never been able to let go of that grief – no matter how much the older girl that she currently was tried to balance the debt of that pain against the venom she directed back, not only at _him_, but at the world.

Bonnie steadied her hands and then wrapped her fingers around the handles of the plastic mugs. She was still feeling ferociously uncomfortable about the situation, but she knew what she had to do. Bonnie's cruelty to Ron and others wasn't so much of a manifestation of her inner self as it was a carefully cultivated tool that she used to mask her true emotions and while she could, and did, use it to further her own goals, she had never before in her life _intentionally_ hurt someone without some purpose in mind. It was a minor conceit, but one that allowed Bonnie to rationalize away the dichotomy that lived within her heart.

Upstairs, Ron fidgeted at the table while he flipped through his history book. Despite what people might have thought about him, he _had_ read it like he was supposed to – Kim had made sure of that after the last report they had done together and she had found out that Ron hadn't been keeping up with the class. Ron had thought, rather naively, that if he had read the entire book than that somehow might impress Kim. He was wrong of course, but the damage had already been done – Ron Stoppable had actually learned something in Mr. Barkin's history class.

"_Not a lot of pages to cover that in here anyway, maybe that's why Bonnie crossed that topic out? That'd be so like her – she always does something for one reason and then makes up the most annoying excuse she can just to get under your skin._"

Ron closed the book and stood up from the table. Bonnie had been gone for a couple of minutes already and he couldn't help but get antsy. Ron was a creature of strange habits, and one of those habits seemed to be an axiom that stated, "A Ron in motion must stay in motion, or quickly become a Ron fully asleep."

He admitted, it was one of his less endearing qualities, but he reasoned that when you could find yourself half way around the world in the middle of the night, getting a little extra sleep here and there wasn't a bad idea.

"_It's kind of creepy how Bonnie's room is pretty much the same as it was in middle school. Everything's pretty much the same – the posters are the same, the pictures are the same, everything. It's like the only thing that's changed is Bonnie._"

Ron moved over towards a small three level bookshelf that rested against the wall. The shelves were full of not only books, but knickknacks and the other assorted dross of teenage life – a cell phone, some seashells, a couple of tiny picture frames – pretty basic, every day stuff. He started to look at the spines of the books, reading out the titles to himself and wondering about Bonnie's taste in literature. Obviously a lot of these books had been in her possession since she was a little girl, or at least he suspected so – it was unlikely that "Horton Hears a Who" was a recent purchase.

"_Never would have pegged Bonnie for a Seuss fan – it seems kind of beneath her for some reason. Hmm, that's a stupid thought, everyone, even Bonnie, was a kid once._"

Ron noticed that on the bottom shelf amongst some other books were a collection of longer volumes. A closer inspection revealed them to be school year books and Ron without thinking reached for them. One in particular caught his eye, if by luck or design he didn't know, but it had a curiously puffed out spine and he struggled for a moment to dislodge it from the shelf.

"_Hmm… middle school? Oh badical, I missed getting mine that year!_"

That wasn't entirely the truth – he hadn't gotten his year book at the end of the semester not by any sort of mistake, but because he had spent the money his parents had given him (foolishly in cash) at Bueno Nacho – his future addiction making it's first appearance in his life at that tender age.

Ron flipped the book open, finding that it had been bookmarked somehow to a certain page. Ron noticed two things right away that caused him a bit of shock and probably caused him to not hear Bonnie's approach from behind.

The page had come open at their class, that wasn't really unexpected – Bonnie and him were in the same grade. What was however was the fact that someone had seemingly drawn a big heart around his picture and then severed it with a jagged line and the fact that the bookmark he assumed was in the yearbook was really something else entirely.

He recognized it immediately.

Bonnie had come up behind Ron, fully intent on apologizing to him for her inadvertent insult earlier, but when she had seen him standing at her bookshelf instead of sitting a the table her heart stopped.

"What do you think you're doing?" she asked him in an alarmed tone.

Ron practically jumped out of his skin and swiveled around to face Bonnie, the book open and resting in his hands and his discovery bluntly plain for Bonnie to see.

"Bonnie!" he screeched, "Sorry! I just saw the yearbook and I…"

Bonnie dropped the mugs in her hands, their liquid contents spilling all over her carpet and with near supernatural speed she crossed the space between her and Ron and snatched the book out of his hands.

"Stay out of my stuff!" she yelled back at him.

"Look, I'm really sorry I wasn't trying to snoop, I didn't know what was in there."

Bonnie, who had been seething with anger moments before froze up in fear.

"_He saw it!_"

Bonnie wasn't thinking clearly, she actually felt slightly detached from her own body almost as if she was observing her actions from orbit. She opened the book and stared down at the page. It was… humiliating. She wondered to herself why she hadn't destroyed it, plenty of time had passed for her to have contemplated getting rid of it in some way, but she had held onto it. Even if she had hid it away, she had never been able to completely rid herself of it.

Gingerly she reached down into the book and retrieved the object. A wave of emotions that Bonnie Rockwaller simply _didn't_ posses came over her and she hesitated as to what she should do.

"I was sort of surprised to see that you kept it," Ron said, "Actually, you probably just forgot about it – it looks like it's been in there for a long time."

There was an uncomfortable silence in the room as Bonnie stared at the object in her hand. Truthfully, she _had_ forgotten about it, but also on some level she had known that it was there. It was a thing that she didn't really want anymore but also something that she was reluctant to part with and she hadn't really thought of _why_ that was.

"I forgot about it," Bonnie said softly.

Ron nodded, his suspicions confirmed.

Bonnie held out her hand towards Ron.

"Take it," she stated simply, but Ron made no move of his own.

"I bought it for you. I mean… it's yours, you can do whatever you want with it but I don't want to take it back."

Bonnie stared at the young man for a moment and then sighed. There was no easy way of getting out of this without her acting decidedly not like herself – something that Ron Stoppable had frustratingly been able to make her do frequently.

Bonnie opened her hand and stared at the object. It was a small, thin bracelet – probably made of cheap silver, and decorated with a few charms. It was… well, it wasn't something she would wear now that was for sure, but at the time she had thought it was about the coolest thing she had ever seen. Part of that was the difference in taste between her age then and her age now, but another, bigger part of it was due to the fact that _he_ had given it to her.

"There's kind of a funny story behind that that I never told you," Ron said with a smirk on his face.

Bonnie tore her gaze away from her hand and looked up at Ron quizzically.

"Kim's birthday party was that week y'know and my parents had given me some money to buy her a present. Anyway, I went to the mall to go see if I could find anything for her and I passed by one of those little booths that they have all over the middle of the mall."

Ron smirked to himself.

"I saw _that_ and all of a sudden I went from buying a birthday present for Kim to a gift for my new… um, I mean you."

Bonnie blinked at the news and then studied the bracelet again, lost in thought.

"_He picked me over Kim?_ _Why did they…_"

Her thought was cut off as Ron continued, "Anyway, the funny part of the story was that I only had like a dollar left over – I wasn't very good at math and I really wanted to get that for you, uh… sorry, getting side tracked, I tend to do that a lot when I'm nervous. My mom says it's because – "

This time it was Bonnie's turn to cut Ron off, "What did you do?"

"Huh? Oh right – I took that dollar to school the next day and the Bookmobile happened to be there, so I used my lunch money along with the dollar to buy Kim a Babysitters Club book and a cheap poster that said something like, Don't Paws For Life! It had a puppy on it."

"Really?" Bonnie said with a slight smirk on her face.

"Yeah. It was kind of lame – actually Kim was a pretty good sport about it, she even put the poster up on the back of her bedroom door. Well, for like a couple of months anyway. Still, I could feel her shooting dirty looks at me every time she thought I wasn't paying attention."

Bonnie actually chuckled at that remark, something that Ron wasn't sure he had heard her do in… well years. Evidently cheesing off Kim had earned him some points in Bonnie's book.

"_Wow that actually sounded genuine… and pretty nice. Man, Bonnie – what is going on inside that head of yours?_"

Ron was seriously confused. Up until a few seconds ago he wasn't sure exactly what Bonnie was planning tonight. Oh, he had himself mostly to blame for the feelings of apprehension he had – after all, if he hadn't mistakenly confessed to Bonnie then the episode at Bueno Nacho wouldn't have happened and he'd have nothing to fear from Yori's sudden announcement of their "surprise nuptials". But still, even though he had screwed up pretty massively it looked like somehow things were working out just fine. In fact, he had come up here tonight with the intention of clearing everything up with Bonnie, but now that she seemed to be… well, almost relaxed a little bit, he was hesitating. He tried to chalk it up to him just wanting to re-establish his friendship with Bonnie, but that was only partly true.

He had an unanswered question and only Bonnie Rockwaller could answer it for him.

Ron wasn't ready however to broach that subject, or even to admit that he was curious to his self. So instead, he tried to divert the conversation back to the relatively "safe" area of their mutual homework assignment.

"I was thinking Bonnie, I came on a little strong over the project earlier – and while I still feel pretty strongly about it, I'd like to hear what you think you'd like to do."

Bonnie had seemed to be thinking of something and Ron's new approach to the situation had caught her slightly off guard. Casually she replaced the charm bracelet in the book and placed it on her bed.

"Actually Ron I was thinking we should go with…" she paused for a moment, not wanting to actually say the words, but not being able to come up with an euphemism that didn't sound utterly ridiculous, "…the holocaust."

"Really?" Ron asked, more than a little surprised – he wasn't used to Bonnie agreeing with him or his ideas.

Bonnie turned to look into Ron's face, "Yes. I think you really care a lot about it and I think you'd do a good job and…"

Bonnie's voice dropped a little lower.

"I think your family history would really help people put things in perspective."

Bonnie really agreed with that. What little Ron had confessed to her had definitely managed to somehow make a distant and nearly unfathomable event seem very, very real to her.

Ron was almost taken aback by Bonnie's words. He had never really believed for a moment that Bonnie was _really_ entirely like the way she portrayed herself in public, but to see her being… well, basically a _decent_ human being seemed to be a vindication of sorts – one that spoke directly to Ron's desire to see the best in people.

"Well, if you think so Bonnie I'm cool with that. We could always use my parents for resources if we don't want to go entirely off the history book."

Bonnie had thought of that – the fact that Ron's family had been directly involved in such a horrible event pretty much guaranteed that they would get an 'A' even if they did a half assed job. It was a disturbing thought and as soon as it was completed, Bonnie was overcome with a wave of disgust at herself.

"_That's sick Bonnie. Exploiting Ron's dead relatives for a good grade is beneath even the Queen B._"

"Well, I guess so." Bonnie responded awkwardly, "In any case – I need to get this pop off the ground. I'm going to get some paper towels."

Bonnie reached down and picked up the mugs from the floor and then left for downstairs, leaving Ron alone in her bedroom. This time, however, Ron behaved himself and sat patiently down on Bonnie's bed. He looked intently at the book that she had haphazardly left on top of the ruffled comforter and it took a colossal amount of willpower for him to resist opening it again to stare at the contents, and especially at the scribbles that had framed his own portrait.

"_Did I do something to Bonnie?_"

Ron tried to wrack his brain for any sort of clue that could reveal the meaning behind the yearbook and it's contents, but it had been a long time since he had thought about this time in his life – slowly he began to realize why; the experience had been both confusing and painful to him and in true Ron-fashion, instead of dealing with it he had slunk away back into the safety of his anonymity and his friendship with Kim.

Downstairs, Bonnie was putting the now empty mugs into the sink and looking for some paper towels to clean up the mess she had made in her room. Just as she was reaching across the kitchen counter, she heard the front door to her house open up followed by some rather loud hushing noises and a few scattered drunken giggles.

"_Great, just what I needed – Connie and Lonnie are home and it sounds like they hit the bar on their way back into town._"

Bonnie held her breath while she stood stock still in the family's kitchen. She was feeling rather out of sorts at the moment, even she guessed, a little emotionally vulnerable and it wasn't the right frame of mind that she needed to be in to deal with her two elder sisters and their incessant cruel taunting. She breathed a sigh of relief as she heard the voices retreat; the two girls were probably going to their rooms.

Of course, the relaxation was only momentary as Bonnie realized she had made one fatal error – she had left the door to her room open.

She was just barreling up the last few steps of the staircase when she heard it, her sister Connie, making a drunken squeal.

"Oh! Look Lonnie! There's a boy in BonBon's room!"

Ron looked in horror at the two beautiful and extremely drunk elder sisters of the Rockwaller family. The expressions on their faces along with the smell of alcohol coming off them was enough to give Ron real reservations about remaining where he was seated. Unfortunately for him the two college girls blocked the only egress from the room.

"Uh… Hi." Ron offered meekly.

"It talks!" said Connie as she strode across the room, peering down to look at Ron like he was some odd exhibit at the zoo.

"Hey you two! Get out of my room!" yelled Bonnie as she finally arrived on the second floor landing.

"Aww, is little BonBon jealous?" asked Lonnie in a sarcastic voice, "Don't want to lose whatever dweeb it is that you're letting screw you this week?"

Bonnie's face fumed red at her sister's words but she felt herself go silent as she couldn't muster a response equal to the pure venom in Lonnie's insult.

"Hey there boy," purred Connie as she leaned over Ron, "Why don't you forget about my slut little sister and…"

Connie was already wearing a very loose cut singlet top that draped across her ample bosom. Leaning over the way she was, Ron was privy to more than a little bit of her nearly flawless skin and he gulped in nervousness as she approached. Connie, emboldened by the alcohol and always happy to get a rise out of Bonnie, reached for the top of her own shirt, hooking her fingers onto her bra and shirt and pulled the entire ensemble down, revealing her right breast to Ron, just a few scant inches from his face.

"Try a real woman," Connie grinned as Lonnie guffawed in the background – she was obviously relishing in both Ron's discomfort as well as in Bonnie's humiliation.

Ron felt his tongue catch in his throat and his eyes get as wide as dinner plates as he stared down Connie's perfectly tanned solitary endowment. His brain didn't even have time to register (or fully enjoy) what was being presented to him before the sound of shattering glass, followed by flying jagged shards, assaulted his senses.

Unbeknownst to all four parties a single solitary figure had been crouching on a tree right outside this window for the last 5 minutes. She had found this spot too late to have witnessed the earlier exchange between Ron and Bonnie, but as fate would have it, had arrived perfectly in time to see her "husband" being presented with what she felt was one rather over-large naked breast.

Yori's dramatic entrance surprised everyone in the room. Both Bonnie and Lonnie gasped, their mouths hanging open, as the small black shadow sprang through the previously closed window. Ron, his reaction time a little better than average, but his bravery a little worse than average, had both managed to simultaneously scream as well as stand up.

This turned out to be in equal measures, awesome and awk-wierd.

Ron hadn't been paying attention to what was in front of him – namely, Connie's _front_. Because of this when he arose, with his mouth still open mind you, he found himself inadvertently duplicating a past scene from his life, breast feeding circa 3 months old, on Bonnie's elder sister.

Connie for her part was equally as surprised as well as frightened – Yori had literally exploded into the room just a few feet away from her. Without thinking she latched onto the first thing that was close to here, which unfortunately for everyone involved happened to be Ron – or more aptly, Ron's head.

The head, which we remind you, that was firmly attached to Connie's own naked bosom.

This entire scene happened within the span of mere seconds and it took only a second longer for one _extremely _irate young ninja girl to point a gloved finger and scream at the top of her lungs – "GET AWAY FROM MY HUSBAND!"

The voice shocked Ron, but he understood finally what had happened. He comforted himself with one last thought.

"_Hey, if I die now at least the obituary will be interesting._"

-

A/N:

This entire chapter took on a life of its own somewhere around the midway point. I'm a lot more pleased with how it turned out than I thought it was going to be even though it ran about a fifteen hundred words over what I normally like for my chapters. I guess it couldn't be helped, there are, after all, quite a few things that need to be resolved between Bonnie and Ron if those two are ever going to figure out how to repair the rift that has formed in between them.

Still, I've only scratched the surface of what I have plotted out for this story (yes, I now have a full outline of the plot down on paper) – so be prepared for a lot more of this fiction before we reach the end.

Once again, thank you for reading and please take a moment of time to review and offer me your thoughts.

Cheers,

QC


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9 – Driving Ms. Bonnie.

"GET AWAY FROM MY HUSBAND!"

Those words reverberated off the walls of Bonnie's room like rolling thunder stunning everyone within range. Oddly enough it was Ron Stoppable who reacted first – maybe it was because of all his years of doing missions with Kim, or perhaps it was because since the evening began he had been on edge, prepared for something to go wrong. In any case, he started to flail his arms wildly to the side of his body. Unfortunately any other type of movement was restricted by the fact that Connie was crushing his head in a fear ridden death grasp against her bosom.

"YORI!" Ron tried to scream. It wasn't until after he had begun his wail that he realized his current situation was prohibitive any form of clear communication.

Connie Rockwaller was frightened to within an inch of her life. She was drunk, wasted even, which only made the sudden appearance of the black clad girl all that much more surreal. In her fear she had grabbed onto the first thing that had been available, which happened to be Ron's head. 

The same head that was trying desperately to speak.

It wasn't that she had heard Ron in so much as she had _felt him_ – or more accurately his tongue flapping up and down on a certain sensitive part of her anatomy.

"OOOH!" she gasped with more than a hint of eroticism.

"Ron, get off her!" came two voices in unison. Both Bonnie and Yori had made a grab for Ron, each one latching onto a different arm and yanking him away from Connie's bosomy embrace with a strength that belied their slim frames.

"Ah! SORRY! SORRY! IT WASN'T MY FAULT!" Ron desperately tried to explain as he felt Yori and Bonnie grab onto his arms with a grip as firm as steel.

"_Oh God! They're going to rip me apart! This is it!_"

Surprisingly it was Bonnie that saved Ron from an untimely demise. Having overcome both her initial shock at Yori's entrance she had felt an undeniable twinge of _anger_ when she had saw Ron's face clutched to her sisters naked breast she had gone on the offensive. The circumstances didn't allow her to reflect upon why she was so angry, so in true Bonnie-fashion she redirected it at a new target.

"What do you think you're doing! That's breaking and entering! Do you want me to call the police? And who's going to pay for that window? Are you listening to me ninja girl? ARE YOU LISTENING?"

Bonnie was working up a real head of steam now and her body was literally shaking with fury. She viciously threw her side of Ron away from her, the momentum twisting him away from both girls and sending him a few feet backwards towards the bed. Ron was grateful for the reprieve and he set about doing what he thought was best considering the situation – cowering.

Yori was flustered. She had been so overcome with jealousy when she had spied Connie's indecent offer through the window that she had tossed years of discipline and ninja training out the window and her self through it. Now that Bonnie Rockwaller was just inches from her face and screaming her head off, Yori found herself scrambling to make some sort of justification for what she had just done. The situation was far worse than one might normally think – if Bonnie _did _file a police report then Yori's visa would probably be revoked, doctored marriage certificate or not.

Yori, knowing that she didn't have an excuse that would placate Bonnie fell back on an old standby. One that seemed to be known and practiced by women across the globe with startling effect – she started pointing blame.

"Me? What do you think that woman was doing to Ron! My _husband_ Ron! I don not know what kind of people you hang out with Rockwaller-san, but I'm sure everyone at school would _love_ to know about this!"

Bonnie's face went stony. She hadn't expected the foreign girl to be so adept already at manipulating the food chain. Instantly she calculated what effect the news of her sisters drunken come-on would have on her own popularity and the result she was coming up with wasn't very good.

"_Ok, she's got me. Still, she doesn't need to know it!_"

"Just get out! Get out before I call the cops!" Bonnie barked at Yori.

"And you two!" Bonnie turned to her drunken sisters, "Out of my room right now or I'm going to tell mom that you were driving drunk… again!"

Bonnie's sisters looked at each other – some sort of unknown communication occurred and they seemed to make up their collective minds. They left without saying a word.

Yori had grabbed onto Ron's hand and had led him from the room when Ron, sensing that he wasn't about to die stopped her at the bottom of the stairs.

"Go home without me, I'll be along after I set things straight with Bonnie – I just need to get my books and um… maybe help her clean up a bit." Ron said.

"Ron-kun…" Yori began quietly, "I am the one that should apologize to Rockwaller-san – this wasn't your fault."

"For once I guess. Anyway, I still need to get my books and I don't think Bonnie would appreciate it if you came back up there."

Yori nodded. She didn't like it, but so long as those two drunken older girls had retreated to their own rooms she didn't think anything worse would happen and she didn't want to do anything that might make Bonnie reconsider calling the police. She tried to give Ron a "farewell hug", but all she managed to accomplish was wrapping her arms around him – he seemed to be too preoccupied to return it. She sighed and turned away. Things had _not_ gone well tonight.

Ron watched Yori let herself out and then sighed to himself. Things had been going surprisingly good with Bonnie until her sisters had shown up. He had a lot of unanswered questions, but he doubted that he'd be getting any answers out of Bonnie, at least not tonight.

"_Hell, for all I know I'm taking my life in my hands just going back up there._"

It was true – Ron had never, _ever_, seen Bonnie so livid and considering how often Bonnie was angry at him that was saying a lot. He was afraid of going up there, but also he knew that what had happened was pretty inexcusable and even if Bonnie wanted to take it out on him, he still had to at least attempt to make it right.

Ron frowned and slowly climbed the stairs on his way back to Bonnie's room. The hall way was pretty dark – evidently Connie or Lonnie had turned off the lights on their way back to their room. The only illumination seemed to come from Bonnie's door – it was slightly ajar and a yellow beam could be seen projecting across the carpet and towards the wall.

Just before Ron was about to reach Bonnie's door he heard a loud sob coming from inside. Cautiously he peeked through the still cracked door – Bonnie was in her room, kneeling on her floor and holding something to her chest and to Ron's surprise, she seemed to be crying.

Ron had never in his wildest dreams would have been able to imagine Bonnie Rockwaller shedding tears. Despite the fact that Ron acknowledged that she was a girl, she just seemed to have too hard of a heart for something like that and this sudden revelation made him see the girl in a somewhat different light.

"_Shit! This is bad, really bad. I was expecting her to be upset, but not like this. I wonder… the window! That's got to be it - her parents are probably going to let her have it._"

Ron made up his mind – he didn't want to continue to stand here spying on Bonnie when she was being so vulnerable, so he decided to announce his presence. He stepped back from the door and then knocked on the other side of it, loudly, twice.

"Bonnie? Are you in there?" he asked in a stage whisper.

Bonnie quickly turned her head, she had heard Ron's voice. She noticed that the door to her room was slightly open, but she couldn't see Ron.

"_Great, just what I need – the loser catching me bawling my eyes out!_"

Bonnie desperately tried to wipe the tears out of her eyes. She knew that she had probably made a mess of her make-up, but she was hoping that Ron was too dense to figure it out. With a fast toss, she flung the yearbook she had been holding on to under her bed and then got up from her knees, feeling a sharp pain in her leg as she did.

"Shit!" she uttered.

Ron opened the door and he saw Bonnie. She had changed positions from the floor. Now she was sitting on her bed with her legs to the side and seemed to be picking at something.

"Shit! Shit! Shit!" she groused, totally oblivious to Ron's presence.

"Bonnie? Bonnie are you ok?" Ron asked warily as he entered the room.

"Does it look like I'm ok? Ow! Ow!" she grumbled.

Ron finally made out what Bonnie was doing. Her slender fingers were tugging at something in her leg. Something that was long, thin and clear.

"Oh damn!" Ron said as he walked across the room to Bonnie.

Ron slapped Bonnie's hands away from the sliver of glass and he looked into her eyes seriously, "Stop playing with it, you'll just work it in deeper and trust me that hurts like a _bitch_."

"I don't care! Get it out!"

Ron took stock of the wound. It penetration point was small, but unfortunately the sliver of glass had somehow gotten very deep into Bonnie's leg and it was troubling to say the least.

"Bonnie? I can get it out, but… I think you're going to need to go to the hospital."

Bonnie's eyes went wide, "What do you mean? It's just a cut!"

"Yeah, but it's in very deep… it might have pierced the muscle and you should have it looked at. Hold on to something."

Bonnie didn't have time to react as Ron quickly jerked the shard of glass out of her leg. The shock of his sudden movement as well as the pain in her leg left her dumbfounded. This lasted a whole 10 seconds until she finally regained control of her mouth.

"OUCH! What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Ron looked at Bonnie apologetically, "Sorry, but trust me on this one – those things are better dealt with that way."

Ron pulled his jersey over his head and then rolled it up, placing it on the now bleeding wound in Bonnie's leg.

"Just hold on to that. Where are you car keys?"

Bonnie pressed Ron's shirt down on her leg. She could see her blood starting to seep through the already red fabric and she fought to hold back a whimper.

"Car keys?" Ron asked again.

"Huh?" Bonnie replied, still not comprehending Ron.

"I'm going to drive you to the hospital – I don't think either of your sisters should be driving any more tonight."

Bonnie wanted to protest, but for once she couldn't come up with the right words to send Ron away. Instead she feebly raised her arm and pointed to her desk and her car keys. Considering the way the evening had turned out Bonnie was holding out hope that there was a special layer of hell for slutty drunken sisters.

Ron retrieved the keys from the desk. With his back turned to Bonnie he started to talk again.

"Sorry about the window, and thanks for not calling the cops. I'll pay for it – just tell your mom or anyone who asks that I broke it screwing around. Everyone will believe that."

Bonnie looked at the scattered remains of her bedroom window on the floor and silently agreed with Ron. It would be better for everyone involved if he took the fall for this one – even if, for once, he wasn't completely to blame for a disaster.

"_Figures though that he'd end up with a psycho stalker for a wife. Can't he do anything normal?_"

"Ready to go Bon-Bon?" Ron asked as he held out a hand to Bonnie.

"Don't call me that!" she snarked back. Bonnie pointedly ignored Ron's offer of help and then gingerly tried to gain her feet. It was going ok until Bonnie tried to put weight on her injured leg – the wound was much worse than she had originally thought and the sharp lance of pain almost made her fall to the ground, but luckily Ron was there to support her.

"Watch out Bonnie!" Ron yelped as he used his hands to steady the shaky girl.

"_For someone who's such a hard ass, Bonnie is surprisingly soft_", he thought to himself as his arms slightly wrapped through Bonnie's own.

"I can walk on my own!"

"Alright then, go ahead", Ron replied. He was just about to remove his hands from Bonnie when suddenly she grabbed on to his shoulders to stop him.

"Um… okay maybe a little help." Bonnie said, her voice slightly more subdued.

Ron changed his position relative to Bonnie's, allowing her to hold onto his shoulder in a way that favored her leg. Together the two of them made there way out of the house, although the stairs had posed a small challenge and it was only once Bonnie realized she was in danger of adding a broken neck to her list of injuries that she had allowed Ron to carry her piggy back style down the stairs.

"Just put me down already!" she said – her voice was louder than normal but the proximity of her mouth to Ron's large ears made it sound like she was bellowing.

"Don't worry Bonnie, no one's going to see you _riding the loser_", Ron smirked at his own comment, his voice heavy with innuendo. Despite the fact that he felt bad about what had happened earlier he knew that with a girl like Bonnie you had to push back every now and then or she would just get totally out of hand.

His comment had the desired effect and Bonnie quit complaining as they made their way to her car. Bonnie considered it was a good thing that Ron couldn't see her face in the position he was in – his "riding the loser" comment had caused her to blush a slight shade of pink.

"Here – I'm just going to turn around and then you can climb down right onto the seat. Ok?"

Bonnie nodded and then began to lower herself off of Ron's back and onto the passenger side of her car. There was a moment there before she was completely sitting down, when she still had her arms on Ron's shoulders that she thought to herself, "_He's stronger than he looks, I can feel the muscles…._"

"You ok Bonnie?" called Ron, his voice interrupting her reverie.

Bonnie blushed furiously and then hastily removed her hands from Ron.

"I'm down. Let's go.", she said seemingly unconcerned. Ron walked around to the other side of the car and hopped in, turning the engine over and then taking off towards Middleton General.

"Don't worry – I've got an in at the hospital. I'll make sure they treat you right." Ron said as he turned down a street in the suburb.

"Kim's mom, right?" Bonnie said as she looked out the window. The scenery was familiar and she had seen it thousands of times, but right now she was more intent at looking away than looking at Ron. She didn't know why, but she just felt like she couldn't handle it right now.

"Um, that too I guess – but I was talking about the people in the ER. I've had more than my fair share of visits over the last few years."

"Freak fighting with Kimmie huh?" Bonnie idly asked.

"That… and I don't know if you've noticed or not, but I'm kind of clumsy."

Bonnie snorted in reply. She could have followed up with a comment of her own, but when Ron made it that easy it just wasn't worth it. Instead she decided to turn the conversation in another direction and she asked a question that had been bugging her for days now.

"Are you really married to that psycho-stalker?" she asked.

Ron grimaced. The phrase "psycho-stalker" wouldn't be how he would choose to describe Yori, but unfortunately considering her behavior back at Bonnie's house it had turned out be fairly accurate.

"Well, that's kind of tricky," Ron tried to weasel out of answering.

"Oh get off it Stoppable. You're either married or your not, there's nothing tricky about it."

Ron sighed. Bonnie technically was right, the problem that Ron was having was deciding if he actually _was_ married. There was the papers that Yori had shown him, and he was pretty sure that he had signed… well, something.

"How about I put it this way – I don't remember a wedding", he said.

"Well then you're not married, are you?" Bonnie replied.

"It's not that simple Bonnie…"

"You keep saying that Ron, but maybe _you're_ the one that's simple." Bonnie chortled to herself.

Ron winced. Leave it to Bonnie Rockwaller to launch a barb at him while he was driving her to the hospital. Still he couldn't blame her. Listening to himself try to lamely explain the situation he would have assumed that the guy in question (himself) was either a dope, mentally challenged, or lying. Or maybe all three.

"She has a marriage certificate. From Japan even. I looked at it and from as far as I can tell it's legit and it has my signature on it, or something that looks an awful lot like my signature."

Bonnie arched an eyebrow – the sudden intrigue of Ron's utterly bizarre personal life making her forget her initial discomfort at the start of the car ride.

"You signed a marriage certificate?" she asked.

"I think so?" Ron said awkwardly.

Bonnie rolled her eyes. "_How can this guy be so dense? Seriously, what kind of idiot gets married and then doesn't remember it?_"

"You realize that can't be legal," Bonnie said as she returned to looking out the window.

Ron blinked.

"What do you mean? It's got our signatures on it, a bunch of seals; it sure looks legal to me."

"Wow, are you stupid or what?" she asked Ron with a serious note of derision in her voice.

Ron's back was up. Sure he was used to Bonnie insulting him but the subject of his "marriage" to Yori was a sensitive one.

"Well _Bon-Bon_," he began, using the diminutive nick-name that she hated, "I may not be the smartest guy in town, but I'm not the one insulting the person driving me to the hospital."

Bonnie valiantly resisted an urge to smack Ron upside the head. Saying it was difficult would have been an understatement. Bonnie didn't know why, but for some reason Ron Stoppable was able to get under her skin like no one else.

"You're too young to be married."

"That's what I keep saying!" Ron exclaimed, "I'm not even out of high school yet!"

"Christ Stoppable!" Bonnie spat as she whipped her head towards the drivers seat, "Don't you get it? You're a _minor_ – you _can't_ be legally married without your parent's permission."

Ron's face fell as the realization set in that Bonnie was actually correct.

"Holy shit! I am the biggest idiot on the planet!" he screeched, taking a turn in the car a little too fast so that the tires echoed him.

"Take it easy with my car and _yes_ you are an idiot. I can't believe that never occurred to you!" Bonnie said as she held on to the side door, trying to keep her leg from supporting her weight in the turn.

Several things finally clicked into place in Ron's head, most prominently amongst them was how Yori's sudden appearance seemed to coincide with Ron's father getting promoted at work and how his parent's seemed suspiciously non-concerned about the fact that their teenage son was married to a woman that they had never met before.

"_I can't believe it! The old man sold me out! I can't believe he'd do that to his own son… actually yes I can. I wonder what they offered him to send me down the river? And Mom… How did he ever get Mom to go along with it?_"

"Grrr…" Ron growled. His knuckles were white from clutching on to the steering wheel in his frustration and anger.

"_Wow… is he mad?_" Bonnie though to herself as she stared at Ron. She had never seen Ron _ever_ get mad – surely, yes, annoyed, yes, angry enough to spit bullets? Not very likely.

"What's eating you?" she asked, against her better judgment. Ron's behavior was just too bizarre for Bonnie to not be curious.

"You ever get the feeling Bonnie that your parents just enjoy messing with your life?"

Bonnie's face went blank.

"I dunno. Maybe," she replied as she crossed her arms over her chest, her body language suddenly getting defensive.

Ron was too absorbed with his own growing sense of betrayal to notice Bonnie's reaction.

"My Dad sold me out. I'm sure of it. Damn it! Damn it!" Ron spat as he turned Bonnie's car on to Main Street, they were just a few miles away from the hospital now.

Upon hearing those words Bonnie instantly made a few assumptions. First off – Ron was having some sort of issue with his Dad, an issue that she should probably find out about since her own father had asked her to do some snooping. Secondly, from the tone of Ron's voice and his physical reaction, he didn't seem too thrilled to be married to Yori.

Inside, a very small and hidden part of Bonnie Rockwaller smiled, happy at the revelation. She tried not to pay attention to it.

"So, your parents gave permission?" Bonnie asked.

"I dunno, I mean… I think so. I need to check, but it just all fits so perfectly. Neither one of my folks seemed to be all that surprised when Yori showed up and Dad all of a sudden has a lot more scratch to spread around – he was even talking about buying me a car. I'm no detective but it's too much of a coincidence."

"Maybe your Dad is just being nice?" Bonnie asked.

"My Dad _is_ nice, but that's not what matters – he's a notorious cheapskate. He reuses the sandwich bags that he takes his lunch to work in." Ron rolled his eyes.

"I don't know how, but I'm betting that Yori's family paid my pops cash money to give them consent to the marriage."

Ron pounded his fist on the steering wheel, irate at both his parents and the stupid red light that was halting his progress on the road.

Bonnie scoffed. While it wasn't outside of the realm of possibility that Ron's parents had been involved with _some_ negotiations with Yori's, Bonnie knew for a fact that the reason Ron's dad had all that money was from something completely unrelated. She didn't know why, perhaps because she just liked to lord over Ron how much more she knew than him, but she spoke without considering the ramifications.

"Your Dad got promoted at work – that's where all the money is coming from."

Ron's jaw dropped. How did Bonnie know that?

"Hey, how do you know that? He said something about it but I doubt that whatever promotion he got would be enough to pay for a new car."

Bonnie put a smug look on her face, she was going to enjoy dropping this bomb on Ron.

"That's because _my dad_ is _your dad's_ boss."

Ron just sat there in silence looking dumbfounded at Bonnie. He didn't know what bothered him more, the fact that Bonnie seemed to know strange things about his family that he didn't know, or that her father could fire his father at will.

"So… your Dad promoted mine? Um… I don't know what to say Bonnie…"

Bonnie looked upwards and blew a strand of hair out of her face.

"No, at least I don't think he did… and the lights green, get moving" she replied.

Ron stepped on the gas, the hospital was only a couple miles up the road and traffic was pretty light. He figured it wouldn't take them much longer to get there.

"What do you mean by you don't think he did? Who did then?" Ron asked.

Bonnie suddenly felt very uncomfortable. She realized that she probably shouldn't have let on to Ron that her father was his father's boss. It wasn't that her Dad had told her not to divulge that information, in fact the elder Rockwaller had left very little instructions for Bonnie, trusting her judgment, it was just that it would be hard to explain to Ron without revealing what her Dad had asked her to do.

"I don't know really… I never pay that much attention to what my Dad says, it's just that we had dinner the other day and he mentioned to me that one of my classmates father's had just been promoted out of the blue to Vice President."

Bonnie alternated between tugging at her ear and scratching it as Ron looked at her. It was lucky for her that Ron wasn't that astute of an observer or he might have realized that Bonnie's body language was betraying her.

"Oh, I see." Ron replied, having bought Bonnie's tale, hook, line and sinker.

At that moment the façade of Middleton Memorial came into view. The car was silent as the two teens pulled into the emergency room parking lot. Between the eventful night and the odd conversation in the car, both of them had a lot of things on their mind. Ron was trying to determine if the information that Bonnie had revealed to him was worth investigating and Bonnie, to her credit, was trying to decide what – if anything, she should divulge to her Dad.

"_He probably doesn't really expect me to come up with anything anyway… maybe I'll just wait a bit longer and then see if this turns out to be something important or not._"

-

"How's that leg looking Doc?" Ron asked from the chair next to Bonnie, who was also focusing on the white haired man with an intent look.

"It's not that bad, but it _did_ go in pretty deep. This was from an outside window right?"

Bonnie nodded.

"When was the last time you had a tetanus shot Ms. Rockwaller?"

Bonnie closed her eyes and tried to think.

"Um… when I was 8 or 11 years old," she said hesitantly.

"At school right? Did you miss the 5th grade booster?"

Bonnie shook her head, "No I was there that day."

The Doctor checked something off on his clip board

"Alright, that's good… Well I'm going to leave you two alone now and then the nurse will come back in to properly dress the wound. It's very deep so I want you to come back in a couple of days and let us look at it again, and if you wake up tomorrow and it's swollen and irritated then immediately come back in. Do you understand?"

Bonnie nodded in the affirmative to the doctor who then excused himself to look after other patients.

"How's it feel?" Ron asked as he looked at Bonnie's leg.

"_And what nice legs they are too… long and tan_", Ron kept that comment to himself.

"It hurts? Duh? At least I won't need stitches. God I hope this doesn't scar", she said as she peered intently at the now cleaned wound.

"Bah, that little thing? Check this out!" Ron smirked as he lifted up his shirt, revealing his chest to Bonnie in all it's pasty glory.

Bonnie was a little taken aback by Ron's sudden action, but her eyes couldn't help but be drawn to the numerous lines that crisscrossed Ron's chest and arms.

"Holy crap! Do your parents beat you or what?" Bonnie goggled at Ron.

Ron lowered his shirt and chuckled, "No, nothing like that. The whole 'saving the world' biz and all that."

"Saving the world huh? I shower with Kim after practice and I've never seen even a scratch on her." Bonnie said.

Ron just shrugged. "Kim's a lot better at it than I am. I always tend to do things that involve either falling from enormous heights, getting blasted, blown up, or otherwise abused in various violent ways."

Bonnie's eyes widened up at Ron's pronouncement, "_He can't be serious?_"

"It's my job," he stated flatly.

"I had no idea…" Bonnie said softly, letting the phrase carry off into the air on its own.

"No one does really, not even Kim. Why do you think I'm always wearing long sleeved shirts? It wasn't that bad at first, but these things just sort of pile up after a while. Hell on our last mission I blew up this doomsday device and didn't quite manage to make it away from the explosion on time – caught hell for that from my parents when they saw the damage."

Bonnie couldn't believe how Ron was so blithely talking about being nearly blown up. On one level she knew that Ron and Kim did that whole "freak fighting" thing, but she never had any idea that it was so dangerous. Despite herself, it piqued her curiosity.

"Why do you do it? I mean… if it's so dangerous, why don't you guys leave it to someone else?"

"Bonnie, me and Kim… we _are_ someone else. We're the people, or I suppose Kim's the person, that they call when no one else can do the job. Technically I'm just the distraction – whatever that means."

"Huh? What does that mean?" Bonnie asked.

"Oh, it's sort of an inside joke. Whenever Kim and I are on a mission it boils down to two things – Kim fights the bad guys and I go and 'make a distraction'. Generally that means that I go and head towards whatever device, bomb, or death ray that the weirdo's are using to threaten the world this time and blow it up."

Ron looked around to see if that nurse was coming any time soon. He didn't know why, but talking about missions, especially his role in them, made him really uncomfortable. It didn't help matters that the person asking him the questions was Bonnie, who usually just noticed him enough in the hallway to launch a put down at him.

Bonnie rolled the idea around in her mind a little bit and then an amusing thought hit her. She chuckled.

"What's so funny?" Ron asked, "And where is that nurse?"

"It's just that… you're saying that Kim doesn't really save the world." Bonnie snickered.

"Huh? What do you mean by that? Of course she does, she's Kim Possible, of Team Possible, get the name?" Ron said, somewhat irked.

Bonnie rolled her eyes at Ron.

"No, that's not what you said. You said Kim fights the bad guys right?"

Ron nodded.

"And then you said that _you_ go and take out the device."

Ron nodded again, not seeing where Bonnie was going with this.

"Take notes here Stoppable, because this is one of your big problems – you never look at things in perspective." Bonnie snarked, "Kim fights the bad guys – she's being the distraction. You then go around the chaos and destroy whatever stupid plot these idiots have come up with. If it was Kim or a Platoon of Marines, it wouldn't matter – you'd still be the one taking out the threat. The _real_ threat. Get it?"

Ron raised an eyebrow at Bonnie. He had never thought of things that way. There were some obvious gaps in Bonnie's reasoning, for starters, Ron wouldn't be going on any missions if it wasn't for the fact that he always tagged along with Kim, but generally speaking depending on how you looked at it, Bonnie _could_ be right.

Ron shrugged at Bonnie, "Well I guess that's one way of looking at it. I try not to think about things like that, if I did it would probably eat me up the way that everyone forgets who I am. Hell, you can do me a huge favor and keep that reasoning to yourself – if any of these wack jobs ever realized who I was and what I was doing, I'd probably get a lot more than a few scrapes and cuts on these missions."

Bonnie, who had been smiling up until then, suddenly made a frown. She hadn't thought of things like that. If Ron really was the one that was saving the world, then it stood to reason that the only way he could get away with that time after time would be if the bad guys were focusing on someone else – Kim in this case. It was kind of ironic that the sidekick was the one that foiled the plots time after time, but so long as no one caught on…

"Crap." Bonnie said with a tone of defeat. Ron just arched his eye at Bonnie.

"I was going to tease Kim about the whole thing, but I can see your point – I wouldn't want you to get smacked down harder than usual just because the word got out."

"Thanks Bonnie," Ron said with a chuckle, "I get stomped hard enough these days without actually drawing attention to myself."

Bonnie waved Ron away, she didn't want to acknowledge the fact that she was thinking of anyone other than herself – it wasn't very Rockwaller-like.

"One thing I do have to know," she continued, "Why do you do it? I mean, seriously, you guys don't even get paid for it. Don't you think that's kind of stupid?"

Ron made a sheepish face and looked down at the ground.

"Trust me, there are days…" he muttered.

"Well then, why do it?" Bonnie pressed.

Ron looked up from the floor and thought for a moment, then he began to speak.

"Basically I do it because of Kim. She wants to do this, really wants to do this… and she wants to do it her way. She needs someone to watch her back and I'd freak out if anything happened to her – she's my best friend."

Bonnie's face got stern and there was an almost palatable aura of icy cold radiating from her at the mention of Kim's name and Ron's heartfelt acknowledgment that they were "best friends". Bonnie didn't want to admit it, but she was jealous of Kim. She had the one thing that Bonnie could never have – Ron, and she had proved it long ago during that party in middle school.

"Oh man, what am I going to do?" Ron said desperately.

He was thinking of Kim and about his situation with Yori. Despite the fact that he was hopeful that there was some way out of his marriage to the striking young ninja girl, things between him and Kim had deteriorated over the last week to new lows – Ron night was history and Kim seemed to be spending even more time with Eric than usual.

"About what?" Bonnie asked.

Ron crept out of his self pity and looked at Bonnie. He had a sudden thought that maybe the brunette could help him.

"_Ok, this is how desperate I am – I'm going to ask Bonnie for relationship advice._"

Ron took in a deep breath and then exhaled slowly.

"Well, I have a problem with a girl…"

Bonnie snorted.

"I'd say, she broke into my house and thanks to her I have this nice gaping cut on my leg."

Ron shook his head.

"No, not that girl – someone else, but Yori is definitely a problem too, but a different one. Actually they're kind of related. I mean with Yori pretending to be my 'wife', it's making things harder than it needs to be with _the girl_. You know what I mean?"

Bonnie was kind of following what Ron was saying, as convoluted as it was it did make a sort of sense.

"_I wonder who the girl is…_"

Memories of a tender confession in a cramped closet just weeks ago came flooding back to her and Bonnie was overcome with a giddy feeling of butterflies in her stomach. It was a much stronger struggle than Bonnie would have anticipated, but she put on a straight face and pushed the feeling away as quickly as she could manage.

"I guess so…" she said noncommittally.

"Bonnie can I ask you a question? Serious?" Ron looked hopefully at Bonnie, waiting for her reply.

"Go ahead Ron, I guess I do kind of owe you for driving me to the hospital."

Ron smiled at Bonnie and for some reason it made her chest get tight.

"_Stop it Bonnie. Stop it right now. It's been a rough night, don't let it get to you. Remember what he did to you._"

"Well you see… there is this girl I like Bonnie. She's really great – beautiful, smart, popular – the whole works. But it's like this, she doesn't even notice that I like her, not even one bit. She's always going out with guys that are more popular than me – and notice I said popular and not better."

Ron leaned back in his chair and stared at the ceiling.

"I know there's a difference and I know you know there is one too. You're not as shallow as you pretend, you're too smart for that."

Bonnie shrugged. Ron was right, she was no dope and she knew exactly what he was taking about, but the food chain was law and there really was no way of circumventing it – no matter how good the guy was, if he wasn't at least as popular as you, or close, then you were taking your high school life in your hands.

"So what do you want from me?" Bonnie asked, gently prodding Ron. Part of her was wondering if she was about to experience another confession and was desperately wondering how she would deal with it. She'd turn him down, of course she would – she had to.

"Just some advice – what do you think I should do?"

"Give up and date someone closer to your level."

Ron winced, it was painful to hear someone tell him the same thing that he had told himself a million times over the last few months. For some reason when you heard words like that coming from someone else, it always stung about ten times worse than when you were lamenting your own stupidity in the privacy of your own thoughts.

"I don't want to give up – at least not yet. I've loved her for a long time, but things aren't that great between us right now. I think if I let things keep going the way they are then… well I just want to try before it's too late."

Bonnie stared at Ron, trying to understand exactly what he was saying. He seemed so… sincere that it really bothered her. It was a sad truth that in the circle of friends that Bonnie traveled in such honest sincerity was in short supply.

"_I wonder if he's hitting on me?_"

Try as she might, Bonnie couldn't get the closet confession at Tara's birthday party out of her mind and it was even harder to dismiss when she realized that the tone and inflection of Ron's voice now was nearly identical as to when he had told her that he loved her.

"Okay…" she began slowly, "Then don't give up. Have you ever thought of, maybe… you know, changing a little bit?"

Ron glared at Bonnie.

"Of course I have! But what can I do? I love her but I want her t like me for who I am and honestly… I like myself."

"_I wish I could say the same thing… where did that come from?_" Bonnie frowned.

"Well what about just showing off a little bit? Guys show off for girls all the time, don't they?"

In the back of Bonnie's mind a plan was forming.

"_Maybe with a little help he could move up a bit… then Tara could go out with him and I wouldn't have to stop hanging out with her._"

Bonnie, as usual when it came to Ron and her intentions towards him, fell back on the "Tara Defense" – it was just too convenient of a self deception.

"What do you mean? Like a new haircut? New clothes? I tried that once, it didn't work out so good."

Bonnie looked Ron over, up and down. He wasn't too bad looking, in fact he was kind of cute, at least he would be if he just updated his wardrobe a little bit… and that haircut was definitely bad. Still, he'd need to do more than that to get even closer to her own stratosphere in the food chain.

"_I mean TARA. Tara! Not mine. Tara!_"

"Updating your look wouldn't hurt, but I was thinking of something a little more serious."

Ron cocked his head at Bonnie. He wondered what exactly it was that she was suggesting.

"Nothing illegal I hope", Ron said with a smirk.

"Are you willing to work for…" Bonnie almost said 'me', but instead changed it at the last moment, "this girl. I mean it, are you willing to put in 110 percent effort?"

Ron locked Bonnie's gaze with his own eyes and gave her a look that smoldered with intensity.

"Bonnie, I've _never_ been more serious in my life. I'm tired of the way things are… really tired."

Bonnie quickly squashed down another bout of the butterflies – Ron's look, his voice, his words…

"_Is he doing this for me? Do I want him to do this for me? Do I want… what do I want?_"

Bonnie's head and heart were at odds, leaving her confused and unable to cope with the way she was feeling right now. She resolved to think about it later, when she could get some distance between her and Ron to sort out her feelings and if necessary, to talk herself out of them.

"Ok Ron," she said, "Here's what I'm thinking…"

-

A/N:

Sorry for the cliffhanger, but them's the breaks people – how else am I suppose to keep people reading if I don't drag out the suspense? Once again thanks to everyone for reading this story and I hope that you're enjoying it just as much as I've been enjoying reading it. Also if you like my relationship writing style and you haven't already done so, click on my profile and check out my Ron Stoppable, Ultimate Monkey Master fiction – I've got a lot of positive reviews and comments on that one. It's not a comedy as this fiction, but it has an intense emotional ride.

Also, for more Ron-centric fare, check out my story Blind Monkey – chapter 2 is up as of a couple days ago and I'm just about to plunge into chapter 3 and some shocking events.

As always, thanks for reading and please leave a review to let me know how you think I'm doing.

Next chapter: Expect High School hijinx to ensue!

QC!


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10 – Project Ron Unstoppable.

-

"Bonnie, that has got to be the stupidest idea that I've ever heard," stated Ron as he stared down from his perch high upon the bleachers at the assembled athletes scrambling around the field below. They looked like some form of alien insects, scurrying around with an almost hive-like co-ordination and try as he might, he couldn't imagine himself belonging with them.

Bonnie Rockwaller graciously decided to let the not-so-thinly veiled insult slide… this time anyway, but she was still tweaked. Three days ago she had made a promise of sorts to Ron Stoppable that she would help him raise his social standing and while Ron had been fairly receptive to most of her ideas, they were still struggling in the realm of extra-curricular activities.

Or more accurately, they were struggling with Ron's utter fear of physical activity.

"Look dorkus – I thought we already agreed that you were going to do _exactly_ what I said. You said, and I quote, _I've never been more serious in my life_, end quote" Bonnie replied while making the appropriate gestures with her hands.

Ron sighed. Bonnie had him on that score. Just like always, it seemed that Ron had gotten so caught up in the moment that he had opened his big mouth before he had a chance to think about what he was saying. He was momentarily troubled that this might be a character trait of his that he'd never overcome.

"_At least this time I'm not getting married off without realizing it… I hope."_

"Ok Bonnie, you got me - but still, while I'm sure a candlelight vigil _may_ make most of the student body remember me fondly, I'm not so sure it'd be the best for my dating life."

At that moment the wind picked up and Bonnie scrunched her face as her normally well coifed hair blew across her eyes. She hated to admit it, but Ron may actually be right about this, however she wasn't quite ready to concede the point… yet.

"It's not that bad! There are plenty of average-ish built guys on the team. You could go out for special teams, like how about… field goal kicker? It's not like I'm saying you need to go out for running back!"

Ron let out a snort.

"Me? A football player? So, not going to happen!"

"All you have to do is kick the ball!" Bonnie replied, her annoyance at Ron's non-stop resistance to all of her suggestions was starting to dissolve her already thin patience.

"Ok, look – technically a kicker is still a football player and technically they could still get tackled, no matter how statistically remote the possibility, and knowing me the first time I was forced to eat dirt I'd probably break my neck. Let's just face it Bonnie, my natural lack of athletic prowess combined with my innate sense of self preservation is just not a good combination for contact sports."

Bonnie turned to face Ron. She paused for a moment, thinking about what the blonde haired boy had just said.

"_He may not be an American all-star, but he's selling himself short. It's more confidence than ability that's keeping him on the sidelines. If only there was a way to make him…_"

"I've got it!" Bonnie crowed triumphantly.

Ron cocked his head – he hadn't seen the brunette cheerleader this enthusiastic since… well since forever basically. It was disturbing and a small wave of dread crept over him.

Bonnie thrust her hand out pointing across the field, away from the scrimmaging football players. Ron let his gaze drift, following her direction, until he saw what she was gesturing to. For the first time since they had started this little project together, Ron considered an idea that_didn't_ make him want to run away in terror. Eventually, he spoke up.

"You know Bonnie… as far as ideas go, that one definitely doesn't suck."

Bonnie smirked, "Of course! It's perfect and it plays to your one major strength…"

In the next breath, both Ron and Bonnie said the same phrase.

"Running away."

Bonnie turned her head to Ron, "So… going to try out?"

Ron nodded.

"Yeah, but first I'm just going to enjoy the peace and quiet… it's been a while, y'know?"

"I've been meaning to ask you about that… How did you manage to get psycho-ninja to leave you alone? Shouldn't she be here mooning over you and threatening me with bodily harm?"

Bonnie silently cursed herself. She hadn't meant for the words to come out of her mouth with such disdain. She had been spending a lot of time recently trying to make sure that she came across as mostly neutral, or disinterested in Ron's girl problems, but it seemed to be getting harder and harder with every passing day. She worriedly watched for Ron's reaction, but it seemed that he hadn't taken any notice. Bonnie thought sadly to herself that Ron had probably written it off as Bonnie's usual bitchiness.

"_That's me – Queen B, the mega-bitch."_

Bonnie tried not to invest any energy in contemplating why, exactly, it bothered her that Ron Stoppable might actually believe she was a bitch. That was a question that she didn't want to answer.

"Ah… that. I took some of your advice." Ron replied with a grin.

"Really?" Bonnie was intrigued now.

"Yeah, I sort of… volunteered her for a few extra curricular activities."

"Stoppable!" Bonnie gasped with fake surprise, "I had no idea you could be so sneaky!"

Ron just looked down and shook his head.

"Well, I did learn from the best."

-

"No, I think _this picture_ would be much better for the yearbook," said an increasingly irate Kim Possible.

"But Possible-san, as you can see _this picture_ is much more aesthetically pleasing," replied an eerily calm Yori Stoppable.

Kim gritted her teeth, she knew that the dark haired girl was just trying to upset her – after all, this was the fifth picture of Yori and Ron that she had tried to get inserted into the yearbook since she had joined the committee the day before. No one, she thought, could possibly be _that_ narcissistic.

"_Well, maybe Bonnie…_"

Thinking of Bonnie made Kim's head hurt. Ron was trying to be subtle about it, but ever since he and the brunette cheerleader had been assigned as study partners, the two of them had been spending an awfully suspicious amount of time together. It wasn't that Kim was jealous per say, it was just that she _knew_ that Bonnie was up to something no good.

"Yori we already talked about this – we can't have too many pictures of the same students. The yearbook is for everyone! Not just you and Ron!" Kim glared daggers as she said the last part – she still wasn't completely fine with the "marital" situation between her best friend and this inscrutable girl from Japan.

For a long moment the two girls stared each other down in a contest of wills. Surprisingly, it was Yori who broke the standoff by giving Kim a devilish smirk and reaching for a stack of photos at her right.

"Then, how about _this one_ Possible-san?" she taunted as she placed a new photo on the desk.

Kim quickly glanced down at the picture. It was a candid shot that one of the student photographers had taken at cheerleading practice. Most of the team was there, including Ron, and normally it might be a decent photo to put in the yearbook, but Kim's eyes quickly focused on something in the background. There, off to the side, was herself, leaning over with one hand up her skirt, quite obviously attempting to free a particularly nasty wedgie.

"N-n-no!" stammered Kim as her face turned a bright red to match her hair.

"But Possible-san, this picture has many students in it!" Yori said with an evil grin.

Kim's hands lurched out attempting to snag the incriminating photograph, but Yori was too quick for her and pulled it away at the last second.

"Give me that picture!" Kim hissed.

"Why? What's wrong Possible-san?" Yori taunted, "Afraid that everyone will see your_enormous _panty devouring butt?"

Yori had said the last part loud enough for the entire room to hear and predictably the other students had focused their attention on the pair.

"Just… give it to me!" Kim hissed as she began to circle the desk that was separating her from the other girl.

Yori shifted her weight on her feet and began to move in the opposite direction of Kim. She knew that the other girl was just as athletic and agile as she was, and it was quite likely that she _could_ get the photo away from her… but Yori wasn't quite ready to end her game yet.

"Maybe we should ask for the opinions of the rest of the committee?" Yori said as she made a mock gesture to show the photo to the other students in the room.

At this point Kim was seeing red, however as much as she would have liked to tear into Yori, her first priority was to get the picture. With one hand, Kim made a feint for photo while she swiveled her feat to the right. Predictably, Yori backed away to her left, allowing Kim to make an extraordinary half-leap across the table, her other hand snagging on to the edge of the offending picture and pulling it away from the lithe ninja-girl.

With a huge grin of triumph, Kim busily began ripping the 'evidence' to shreds. When she was done she looked up at the other girl and gave her the biggest smirk she could muster.

"_That's right! I can do anything!_"

Yori however didn't look in the least bit perturbed. In fact, she just coolly smiled back at Kim and then walked away from the desk towards her school bag. Kim leaned back, thinking that she had claimed victory this day, and crossed her arms in a confident gesture.

"It seems you have won this round Possible-san," stated Yori as she reached down to pick up her bag.

To her credit, Kim didn't respond with a taunt of her own. It wasn't that she didn't_want to_, it was just that a room full of fellow students probably wasn't the place for her to start engaging in insults with a new transfer student – she had a reputation to keep up after all.

Yori fidgeted with her bag, then opened it up and started to smile.

"Oh, that's right!" exclaimed Yori with mock surprise, "I almost forgot!"

"_Ohmygod! That tone…please no…_"

Kim felt the icy touch of fear and she sat ramrod straight in her chair, hoping against hope at about what was to come.

"Being a novice at photography, it seems that I accidentally made too many copies of that picture", she said coyly.

"_Too many copies? Oh no…_"

Kim felt her heart climb up into her throat. She wanted desperately to know exactly what she was dealing with here, but unfortunately for her all she could manage to hurl at Yori was a quite audible "gulp".

"About…" Yori made a fake gesture of counting the contents of her bag, "two hundred or so."

Kim's eyes went round as saucers as the enormity of the humiliation she was about to suffer began to sink in. It was only her years of crime fighting experience that kept her from completely freezing up and while she hadn't completely recovered from the shock, she had managed to already begin to move in the direction of the short haired ninja. Yori however, had been expecting this, so as a pre-emptive move she flung her hand up into the air and released a rain of glossy copies into the air.

Kim flailed about with her arms attempting to snatch every photo she could see, even the ones that had already found their way into the hands of other students. It didn't take as long as one might expect, but by the time she had finished Yori was already long gone. Kim peeked her head out of the classroom that the yearbook committee had been using and nearly fainted at what she saw.

Tracking Yori, she decided, would be rather easy. After all, she had left a trail of embarrassing photos in her wake.

-

Ron leaned down at the starting line, trying to get his feet into the proper position. The track team captain had tried to explain it to him, but being a novice he still felt awkward about his foot placement. He looked up nervously to the side at the senior boy, who just returned Ron's inquisitive expression with a terse nod.

"_Okay… seems like I'm doing good. This should be simple, all I need to do is run in a straight line._"

Ron waited for the other two boys on the track to take their positions. The sun was pretty high in the sky and the combination of it's radiant light and his own ever-growing panic at failure caused a single drop of perspiration to drop off his nose, hitting the red track below him and spreading out into a tiny darkened splotch. He ruefully wondered if that was a bad omen.

"_Just do what Bonnie said… clear your head, focus on the end of the track, let everything else come naturally._"

Ron looked over to Bonnie; she was loitering around the base of the stands attempting to look nonchalant and disinterested in what was going on. Ron had been surprised at how helpful Bonnie had been to him recently, especially considering the colossal misunderstanding that had taken place at Tara's birthday party weeks before, but he was happy nonetheless for the brunette cheerleaders support.

"_Must have been the study session the other day… Bonnie was acting real strange, maybe she doesn't hate me after all?_"

Ron banished that thought from his head. He knew, without a doubt, that he had seriously screwed up with the entire Yori marriage fiasco – especially after Bonnie's attempt to make a date with him at Bueno Nacho. If Bonnie Rockwaller had at one time actually harbored any sort of feelings for Ron, then they seemed to have been either destroyed or greatly diminished; Ever since that single encounter in the fast food restaurant, Bonnie had been treating him coolly, even if she _was_ currently helping him out with his Kim problem.

"_She's probably afraid that I'll start blabbing about her sisters. Hmm… Connie…_"

Ron started to lose focus as his memory drifted back to the events of that night and how close he had come to both heaven and hell within the blink of an eye. He didn't even notice that the other runners trying out for the team had taken their positions and the race was getting ready to start or that Glenn Greenwald, the track captain, had readied the starter pistol.

"_If I concentrate I swear I can almost remember what it felt like in my mouth…_"

Ron absently flicked his tongue a couple times over the phantom nipple of Connie Rockwaller that sadly, only existed in his memory. He was probably just at the point of completely losing it and botching his attempt at the track try-out when from behind him came a shrill shout that brought him back to the present.

"Ron! Stop her!" screamed Kim Possible at the top of her lungs as she lunged at Yori from across a practice field.

Ron swiveled his head to see his best friend chasing his supposed wife and noticed sadly that both of them were heading in his direction.

"_Danna-sama!_" shrieked Yori in a girly voice, "Save me!"

Ron's jaw dropped and panic took over every cell in his body. The last thing he needed was to get caught in the middle of a Kim and Yori catfight, especially when he was supposed to be trying out for the track team.

"_Track team..."_

Ron was in such a distracted state that he hadn't even heard it when Glenn had fired the starter pistol into the air to announce the beginning of the race. He just held there, crouched down, his muscles frozen in fear. Bonnie, who had been surreptitiously watching the entire debacle, broke her cover and threw her arms down to her side.

"Run you loser!" she bellowed out across the field.

Amazingly enough the insult from Bonnie caused the gears in Ron's mind to start churning again as his previous state of indecision was banished by a single thought that, to him at least, seemed like a _really_ good idea.

"_Run!"_

Ron pushed off from the blocks in a flash that seemed to defy physics. The other two runners were already nearly half way up the track, but that didn't seem to bother him at all. He was terrified and true to Ron-form, when terrified he did what he did best.

"_Run!_"

The track below Ron flew by in a blur, his feet chewing up the ground at an amazing pace. Already he had closed on the back of one of the other juniors that was trying out for the team. Ron didn't think anything about it other than the fact that getting past the boy would mean just one more body between him and his imminent destruction. With a gulp of pure terror lodged in his throat he lowered his head to the side and pushed his legs past any sort of limit he had previously known.

"Shit!" came a voice from the sidelines that Ron didn't recognize.

"Did you see that?" came another.

Ron couldn't pay any attention to the voices now. He had passed one runner and was steadily gaining on the other. He knew it would only be a few seconds till he caught up and blew past him, but just about to set himself up for another burst of speed when all of a sudden the boy broke his pace and started to slow down. Ron flew by his head turning back to see what was going on.

"_What? Did they stop chasing us?_"

Ron slowed his pace and swiveled his head around to see what had happened. Kim and Yori were no where to be seen, evidently their battle had passed on to another part of the school. Ron's legs were starting to hurt now and he slowed down from a jog to a walk as he swung back along the track. Realizing that he had probably escaped for the time being, he slowly let his mind relax.

"_Ok! Not going to die! Now for the race…_"

In an instant, Ron realized what had just happened and he brought his hands up to his head.

"Damn it!" he said outloud.

"_Why can't I ever concentrate? I mean, sure, it wasn't entirely my fault, but this was important! If I can't even handle something like this…_"

From across the field, Bonnie Rockwaller bounced with uncharacteristic glee. She had been expecting Ron to do well, but his display of speed on the track was nothing short of God-like. She rolled on her heels and put her arms behind her back as she began to stroll across the track to congratulate Ron, only pulling up short when a blur of blonde hair streaked past her.

"Ronnie! That was so awesome!" tittered Tara Strong with unrestrained glee.

Bonnie glared as she watched her best friend run up to Ron and throw her arms around him.

"_Hey! It was my idea!_" she thought to herself.

Bonnie was peeved and was just about to stride over to Tara to let her have a piece of her mind when she caught herself.

"_What am I doing?_"

The question echoed in her mind as her entire body froze in mid walk.

"_Why did I want to go over there? Why am I jealous of Tara? I'm the one that told him to go out for sports. I'm the one that gave him the pep talk. I'm the one that told that stupid loser to run when he froze up!_"

Bonnie was slowly starting to fume. She clenched her hands to her side, her arms slightly shaking. Her mind and emotions were warring within her and she fought with the self control forged by years of ruling the "Food Chain" against the tiny, almost insignificant feelings that she had thought long ago discarded and squashed. It was touch and go for a few moments, but predictably Bonnie managed to regain control.

Queen B had won again.

Without so much as a thought or a glance, Bonnie swiveled on her heel and angrily walked back towards the school, leaving Ron and Tara alone on the field.

Ron watched Bonnie stomp away and his first thought was that she must have been pissed at him for how he acted during the tryout. It wasn't as if he could blame her; she had spent a lot of time trying to help him out and when they finally hit upon an idea that had a fair chance of working, he blew it.

Ron sighed and turned back to Tara. The blonde girl was now bouncing up and down excitedly, although Ron couldn't quite seem to understand why.

"Tara what's up? Didn't you see – I lost!" Ron said, his voice filled with disappointment.

Tara just stared at the boy dumbfounded, not believing that someone could possibly be so dense. She was just about to explain to Ron exactly what had happened when Glenn, the track captain, interrupted.

"Stoppable! It's Stoppable, right?" said the lanky senior.

Ron nodded.

"Yeah… hey, sorry about wasting your time there…" Ron began to apologize, but the other boy didn't seem to hear him.

"You've never run track before, right?" Glenn asked with an air of enthusiasm in his voice.

Ron's apology was brought up short and he shook his head 'no', not quite understanding what was about to happen.

"That's amazing!" the older boy gushed.

"Huh?" said Ron, completely lost now.

"Man that was some of the _fastest_ running I have ever seen!"

"Wait, what? Uh… I didn't win the race, what are you talking about?" asked Ron.

Glenn chuckled.

"Well yeah, your start was absolutely rotten. Hell I thought you were going to completely freeze up there, but once you got going you were like a bullet!"

Ron tried to digest what the senior was trying to say to him.

"So like… I did good?" he asked quizzically.

"Better than good man! That was awesome! If you had left the blocks when you were supposed to, I think you would have set a school record!"

At this pronouncement Ron's face fell and Tara let out a little squeal.

"See! I told you Ronnie! You were incredible!" she giggled as she bounced up and down.

"_Wow, wait until I tell Bonnie! This is totally going to blow her mind… Err, actually maybe that can wait, she seemed kind of pissed. I can tell Kim though! She'll be really proud of me – I just know it! Me! An athlete! Wow… Tara sure is jiggly when she bounces up and down like that…_"

Tara caught Ron's wandering eye and blushed a healthy shade of pink.

"_Finally! He's looking at me!"_

It took all the self control that Tara could muster to not start shimmying right there in front of Ron and half of the track team. Instead she ducked her head down, leaning forward with her arms pushing forward certain "assets" so that he could get a better view.

"Ronnie…" she began coyly, "What are you thinking about?"

Ron was just about to respond when Glenn slapped him on the back.

"Joining the track team of course!" the older boy interjected.

The loud slap on his back snapped Ron out of his daze, much to the disappointment of Tara. The words that Glenn had said slowly began to sink into his head and he reluctantly tore his view away from Tara's chest and faced the track captain.

"Are you serious?" he asked.

Glenn nodded.

"You'll still have to make the first and second round of cuts, but we want you to start practicing with us. You've got a lot of raw talent Ron, but you still need to learn the technical side of the sport. I mean, really, that start was total crap…"

Ron pumped his head vigorously up and down in agreement.

"But we can work on that. So what do you say Stoppable?"

Ron, without a hint of hesitation in his voice, blurted out his agreement.

"Yes! Absolutely!"

Glenn broke out in a broad smile and slapped Ron on the back again.

"Awesome! See you at practice Stoppable!"

Ron smiled to himself as the older boy walked away back to where the track team had gathered. He had been very unsure about following Bonnie's advice, but now that he had his first real taste of success he felt himself sort of enjoying it. Ron had never thought of himself as an athlete, but now that it had become a real possibility he was starting to enjoy the idea.

"Tara?" Ron asked.

"Yes?" she replied.

"Do cheerleaders go to track meets?" he said in a dreamy voice.

Tara giggled. "Not usually Ron…"

Ron's face clouded up a little bit. He knew the answer to that question, but in the excitement he had forgotten. Still, Kim would probably come anyway…

At that moment the loud electronic bell sounded out from the school announcing the end of the free period and demanding that the students get back to their last hour of the day.

"Crap! Gotta get changed and back to class!" blurted out Ron as he ran towards the building.

"See ya Tara!"

Tara Strong just sighed as she started her own lonely walk back to the main school building. For some reason she felt that she had just missed a big opportunity, she didn't even get a chance to tell Ron what she had been thinking.

"_Maybe not all the cheerleaders Ron, but this one would show up…_"

-

Bonnie Rockwaller stalked the halls of Middleton High like a thundercloud preceding a storm. Her mind was a collection of jumbled thoughts as she passed through the faceless crowds emptying out of their classrooms and heading home for the day. A few of the girls in her "inner circle" waved to her, but she ignored them. No doubt they would now spend the entire evening wondering if Bonnie was about to cut the legs of their social standing out from underneath them. She even bumped into a flustered Ron Rieger, who dropped his books nearly right on top of her. Bonnie just ignored it and moved on, not even bothering with an insult or a withering look.

She was just too damn occupied to care.

She was just too damn upset to care.

She was just too damn confused to care.

"_That asshole! He says all these things to me… and then he flirts with other girls. He's just a lying jerk – I knew that already! I knew it! Why did I think it would be different this time?_"

Bonnie gritted her teeth – she hated this line of thinking. In fact, she had spent quite a bit of time, especially recently, trying to suppress it. It brought up memories that she was uncomfortable with and feelings that she had spent a long time trying to forget.

"_Forget it. Forget the entire thing. He's a loser, a jerk, an idiot, a bumbling fool. Don't let him get under your skin Bonnie! Just… go back to the plan._"

Bonnie slowed her stomping and came to a halt in front of her locker. She flipped it open and began to pack her bag for the trip home. She didn't really know when it had happened, but some time within the last three days she had pretty much abandoned the contrived notion that she was "helping Ron for Tara's sake" and in doing so had put some serious dents in a wall that she had spent years building. She had tried to ignore it as much as she possibly could, but today when Tara ran over to Ron she couldn't ignore the overwhelming jealousy that boiled under her skin. It was the final slap in the face that she needed in order to face the truth.

She didn't know how to deal with it.

"_I'll just set him up with Tara. Tara is super sweet, once she manages to get a hold of Ron he'll never look away…_"

Bonnie knew that this was true. Tara Strong, despite her seemingly ditzy nature, was a real keeper and while Ron might be somewhat oblivious about a lot of things, he also was quite possibly the most loyal person Bonnie had ever met. The way that he constantly hung around Kim Possible, like a puppy chasing after a bone, only served to underline the point. Bonnie felt that if she could transfer that dogged determination from Kim to someone else, then she would at last be able to strike a blow against Kim that she could never recover from. It would be a victory for Bonnie over her arch-rival, but try as she might she couldn't seem to muster up her normal level of enthusiasm for making Kim's life hell.

"_Right… Ron going out with Tara would really suck… for Kim. Once he's good and hooked I can tell Tara to cut him off if he doesn't drop Kimmie like a bad habit. Then he'll be all mine, not Kim's."_

Bonnie was in the process of dropping a book into her bag when that last thought hit, and it made her freeze up - the heavy text book slipping from her fingers and hitting the floor with a resounding thud.

"_No… all Tara's. Not mine. Tara's._"

Bonnie sighed and leaned down to fetch her book. Just as she was standing up a voice from behind her startled her.

"Hey Bonnie!"

It was Ron, and Bonnie did her best to growl out something insulting. However, all she could manage was a half hearted "harrumph."

"Did you hear? I got on the track team!" Ron said proudly.

Bonnie turned around to face Ron, pushing her locker closed with her shoulder.

"Ron… I was there", she said flatly.

Ron shrugged.

"Yeah, but you left before Glenn invited me to the team. I thought maybe, well, you'd like to know. After all, it was kind of your idea…" Ron let the sentence trail off. Bonnie was being difficult, as Bonnie was wont to do, but for some reason that Ron couldn't put his finger on, her normal front of resistance seemed… off.

"It was pretty obvious they were going to invite you. Your start was total crap, what was that about by the way, but once you got moving you were the fastest guy on the track – everyone could see that."

Ron just snorted. It seemed like everyone _but him_, had realized what he had did until it had been spelled out for him. He supposed that he was just so used to trying to measure up, but always coming up short, that unless he had some sort of obvious, tangible, proof of victory, he just assumed that he lost. He was just barely starting to realize that this maybe wasn't always the case.

"I was distracted…" Ron began, but then decided to switch gears, "Anyway, are we still on for the project tonight?"

Bonnie waited long seconds before she responded. Internally her brain was telling her to make some sort of excuse, but when it came time to open her mouth the words that came out seemed to contradict that sentiment.

"I guess", she said noncommittally.

Ron nodded.

"Same plan as before?" he asked, "Wait 10 minutes until after you've left and then meet up at your house?"

It was a rule that Bonnie had instituted at the beginning of their formal "partnership" in this limited endeavor. She felt bad when she had said it, she knew it must have been humiliating to Ron, but she also had to take steps to protect her place at the top of the school's food chain. Ron, for his part, if he was upset – didn't show it. He had just merely nodded at Bonnie, accepting that it was the price he would have to pay for her help. Still, deep down inside, Bonnie felt guilty about the entire deal.

It was probably why she just shrugged and said, "Whatever – let's just go", and then began to walk out of the school, leaving a slightly stunned and bemused Ron Stoppable to trail along behind her.

-

Unbeknownst to the two teens, a single figure had inadvertently witnessed their exchange and a pair of fierce emerald eyes tracked the both of them as they left the school. The look of puzzlement on the eavesdropper's face suddenly turned into one of concern and she began to walk towards her locker.

Kim didn't know exactly what Bonnie was up to, but she knew it had to be dirty and probably directed at her. With the relationship between her and Ron at an all time low, it seemed unlikely that she was going to be able to get any information out of him, so she decided instead to rely on the other member of Team Possible. Wade, after all, would be able to put the pair under electronic surveillance. Sure, he might complain a little bit, but she'd just have to explain to the young genius that what they were doing was for Ron's own good.

Kim was pretty sure she could handle anything that Bonnie threw at her, but she didn't want to see Ron get hurt in the process.

At least, that was what she was telling herself.

-

A/N:

Sorry for the huge delay in chapters. I moved from the USA to Australia (after moving from California to Michigan to Arizona in the year previously!) and I've been having problems getting back into the swing of things. I'm going to try to update more frequently from now on, but I also have a lot of ideas for other stories so we'll see which one hits me with that creative lightning bolt first.

As always, thank you for reading my story and please drop me a review to let me know what you think!

Cheers,

QC


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11 – Close Encounters of the Awk-weird Kind. Part I.

-

Ron Stoppable bent over the long wooden bench and scooped up one of the last remaining clean towels from a pile that had been left there. He unfolded it roughly and brushed it across his face, his nose wrinkling from the caustic scent of the school district issued laundry detergent.

"_I suppose it smells clean… or at least something close to clean. Cleaning product, maybe?_"

He sighed outwardly, letting loose the pent up weariness from the track practice and slumped down against a locker. The last few days had taken a heavy toll on the young man and it was starting to show in all the usual ways. His body ached from a combination of steady physical exertion due to his new after school commitment to the track team and his eyelids felt heavy from a lack of sleep that could be directly attributed to both late night study sessions with Bonnie Rockwaller and his own increasingly futile attempts to dodge Yori's steadily escalating love-attacks. He knew that he was coming close to the limits of both his willpower and endurance.

Something was going to have to change before he folded like a house of cards.

"_I can't take much more of this. I need some sleep, I need a day off, I need Kim to stop being angry at me… Hell I need some nacos and twelve hours of Zombie Mayhem, maybe then I'll feel human again."_

Ron wasn't much for planning, but he also had never really been in a situation before that really required much in the way of a plan, or to be honest, thinking more than a couple hours ahead. Recently however that had begun to change, and while he was still struggling to adjust to the entire concept of having _responsibility_, he felt that for the first time in his life he was starting to get the hang of it.

He rubbed his eyes and turned towards his own personal locker, mentally ticking through the list he had been assembling over the last day.

"_Step 1: Solve the Yori sitch. Step 2: Make the track cut. Step 3: Make up with Kim. Step 4: Feed Eric to some monkeys. Step 5: BOO-YAH!"_

He threw the now used towel into a nearby laundry hamper, the end of the towel sliding precariously over the edge, and reached for his clothes.

His _new_ clothes.

Ron had been shopping. Gone now were his old baggy cargoes and the infamous red hockey jerseys and in their stead was a combination of simple blue jeans, white t-shirt and a black bowling shirt. He looked sideways at himself in the mirror that hung inside his locker and ran his fingers through his hair, momentarily pausing for effect, and then decided that for once what he saw really wasn't all _that_ bad.

Originally when Bonnie had gone after him about his style, or more specifically, his lack thereof, he had started to protest loudly. It wasn't that he didn't agree that _perhaps_ his choice in clothing was a bit dated, in fact, he actually agreed with Bonnie on that score. It was just that he still had bad memories from a certain haircut and the fallout that had ensued. He had reminded Bonnie of this, and then flat out said no to her on the clothes issue. Much to his surprise, Bonnie had just shrugged at him and said, "Whatever you want Ron."

It almost made his head explode.

Bonnie had really started to surprise Ron and he had often begun wondering if he had been perhaps a bit too judgmental about her. He begrudgingly admitted to himself that it wouldn't have been the first time that he had jumped to an unwarranted conclusion, yet despite Bonnie's apparent change of heart, he still had years of evidence to the contrary and it was hard to just dismiss it all. Oh, he had seen inklings of this slightly different Bonnie over the last couple of weeks, especially since the now notorious "Bueno Nacho Incident", but for some reason it seemed that the longer he spent time around Bonnie, the more she seemed to… tolerate him. Maybe even… like him?

"_It's an act Ron,_" he heard Kim's voice echo in his mind.

It had been, and still remained, a possibility, and one that Ron had contemplated on more than one occasion. Still, he often found himself doubting _which_ part of Bonnie Rockwaller's personality was _the act_ and which was her true self. He sadly lamented that he probably wasn't smart enough to figure it out.

In any case, Bonnie's acquiescence to his demand of "No new clothes" had thrown him for a loop. It wasn't exactly what he had been hoping for, such a sudden end to what he had been anticipating would be an epic confrontation of wills and truthfully he had been a little let down. Arguing with Bonnie was… kind of fun, he thought. Oh, not in the mean spirited way that they often fought with each other in public, but more in the challenging way that two friends might verbally spar with each other. The two of them had many disagreements over the last few days, but for some reason Bonnie Rockwaller never accepted Ron's lame excuses or allowed him to divert the conversation in attempts to distract her. She had both a single minded focus and her own opinions about what was good for Ron and she made no bones about letting him know it.

The two of them had been walking through the Upperton mall, one of the few public places that Bonnie would allow herself to be seen with Ron since it was unlikely that any of their classmates would be around, when this exchange had taken place and Ron recalled how her words had brought him up short. He planted his feet and turned to her.

"What do you mean, 'Whatever'?" He had asked, a slight hint of irritation in his voice.

Bonnie in turn had just shrugged.

"Whatever, whatever,"she stated bluntly.

There was an awkward moment of silence and then the two of them resumed walking at a slower pace.

Ron's thoughts were jumbled around in his head and he spoke the first words that came to his mind.

"It's not like you to just give up like that!"

"Oh really?" Bonnie responded, feigning surprise.

Ron fumed for a second. Part of him suspected that Bonnie was up to some sort of trick, some sort of smart person trick, the kind of trick that Ron knew he was ill-equipped to figure out.

"You don't like my clothes," he stated flatly.

"Whatever gave you that idea Ron?" She said sweetly.

Ron, despite his normal goofy demeanor, was beginning to lose his cool. It was odd how he could shrug off insults from villains, bullies, even his best friend, like water rolling off a duck's back, yet when he was talking to Bonnie like this she could get under his skin in less than six seconds. The girl had _skills_, Ron had to give her that.

"No one likes my clothes."

Bonnie shrugged, followed by another lingering moment of silence, before she spoke.

"Do you like them?"

"They're comfy." Ron replied.

"Comfortable clothes are easy to find, you just have to look."

Bonnie had brought their slow amble to halt so that she could look into the window of the Upperton mall's branch of Club Banana. Ron thought he knew what was coming next, so he decided to nip it in the bud.

"I am _not_ shopping at Club Banana. It's the same stuff that they sell at Smarty Mart, only marked up like a billion percent!" he sneered.

"Ok." Bonnie said.

The retort that Ron had planned to Bonnie's inevitable comeback died on his lips.

"_Dammit! What is she up to?_" Ron thought to himself as he thrust his hands deep into the pockets of his cargo pants.

There were rules to these kind of things. She would badger him, he would deflect. She would get insistent, maybe even pedantic, and he would obfuscate. She would get frustrated, he would drop a non sequitur so profound it would act like an amnesia inducing bomb and the entire interaction would be forgotten. These were the rules. Kim always played by the rules, why wouldn't Bonnie?

"I'm serious. It's all over priced," he said, sounding more than a little bit lost.

Bonnie slowly tore her eyes away from the impeccable Club Banana window display and started to walk way. Ron didn't notice it at the time, but she had gently latched herself ontohis arm and started to lead him through the mall.

"You like Smarty-Mart, don't you?" she asked innocently.

Ron nodded, "Yes…"

A subtle smile crept across the picture perfect lips of Bonnie Rockwaller. If Ron had been more observant he would have realized that he was about to be played… big time.

"There are… good deals there. Good value. Right Ron?"

Ron was momentarily distracted by the scent of baking pretzels as they narrowly worked their way through the food court. They hadn't eaten lunch yet and a Ron with an empty stomach was an easily distracted Ron.

"Right Ron?" Bonnie repeated.

"Uh… yeah, good value." Ron echoed in a low blood sugar induced daze.

"And the clothes… They're completely the same as Club Banana, right?" Bonnie cast these last few words about like an angler going for the big catch.

Ron took the bait.

"Absolutely!" he said by way of automatic response. There were very few things that could cause Ron Stoppable to be distracted from imminent hunger, but it just so happened that his love of all things Smarty-Mart was one of them.

"It's such a scam Bonnie! Did you know that both stores are owned by the same company?" Ron began his patented consumerist rant while Bonnie feigned surprise at his words.

"Really?"

"Yep! All they do is slap a Club Banana label on it and then mark it up to high heaven."

Bonnie nodded in agreement with Ron, while subtly maneuvering him towards her intended destination.

"Some people, like a certain cheerleader who shall remain nameless, refuse to face the facts that they are being ripped off. Some people on the internet even call it a conspiracy, but not me! The way I see it, it's just a tax on fashion snobs. Those poor, poor, deluded sheep…"

Ron's voice trailed off as he looked up, finally realizing where they were.

"Hey… we're here…" Ron said with a hint of suspicion as he looked up at the familiar mortar board capped visage of the Smarty-Mart mascot.

Bonnie chuckled internally to herself and cast her line.

"Hey Ron? Aren't those pants the _same ones_ that I just saw at Club Banana?" She said, while pointing to a large rack of clothing near the entrance of the store.

Ron's eyes narrowed as he stared at the articles in question. Something inside him snapped and a powerful feeling of _vindication_ swept over him as he realized that for perhaps the first time in his life, he was about to prove to someone that he was right. True to Ron-form, he immediately became swept up in the moment.

"Yes! See that's exactly what I'm talking about! Look at these…" Ron marched off in the direction of the circular clothing rack, leaving a grinning Bonnie Rockwaller to follow in his wake.

The poor boy had taken the bait all she needed to do now was reel him in.

Even now, as Ron finished doing up the last button on his new shirt, he wondered exactly _how_ he had managed to leave Smarty-Mart approximately two hours later with an empty wallet and a new wardrobe. Simply put, in his mind, Bonnie Rockwaller was quite likely the most dangerous woman alive. Sure, Shego could fry you on the spot, DNAmy would mutate you if she got the chance, and Kim could break you apart with 16 different styles of kung-fu, but to his knowledge Bonnie Rockwaller was the only person in the whole world who could make your own brain work against you.

"_It was like some sort of girl Jedi mind trick. No, Ron, these are not the pants you are looking for._"

Ron shook that disturbing thought from his head as he made his way out of the locker room and towards the now abandoned halls of Middleton High. School had been out for a couple hours now and the only people still lurking around were other athletes or people who had bizarre after school club commitments that Ron could never understand. Why join a club to stay after school? It was absolute madness.

"_It's not like she really tricked me. Sure, I was hungry and probably not thinking quite straight but honestly… I kind of enjoyed it. It was actually fun and it was kind of nice to have a woman's opinion. Bonnie definitely knows her stuff too. I probably would have started dressing nicer ages ago if Kim would have helped me out._"

Ron snorted at the inherent irony of his last thought. Kim Possible was the girl who could do anything, except it seemed, enter a discount retailer. It wasn't that Ron hadn't _tried_ to get her to see the splendors of Smart-Mart's unique brand of value shopping; it was just that Kim, for whatever reason, avoided the place like the plague. He supposed that he understood, after all, Kim did have a reputation to uphold…

But then again, so did Bonnie.

"_Am I slow or what? Bonnie… BONNIE ROCKWALLER went into Smarty-Mart with me. She didn't even ask me to keep it a secret. What the… Why? Why would she do that?_"

Ron stepped out of the wide double doors at the front of the school, the cooling afternoon air caressing his face and banishing away his thoughts for a moment. He stood there for a few seconds, merely just basking in the fading sunlight and looking across the treetops towards the sky.

"_She… she doesn't? Does she?_"

Ron started to walk down the sidewalk towards his house, his feet following a familiar path, but his thoughts wandering down corridors that he had previously left unexplored.

Three words. Three little words. He had said them with abandon and without a thought to whom he was actually saying them to. Oh, how they had come back to haunt him.

"_I love you._"

Three tiny, single syllable words. Insignificant in the course of grammar, profound in the depth of English language, he had said them, in a darkened room to a cornered Bonnie Rockwaller. Three words that expressed exactly how he felt. Three words that laid bare his soul and heart. Three little words.

Three little words that he had said to the wrong woman.

Ron groaned as he rounded the corner towards the street that he and Kim lived on, its familiar shady trees playing shadow puppets on the sidewalk and across his body as he stared face down at the sidewalk, an intense mask of concentration on his face. His eyes focused on the tiny cracks and flaws in the concrete path, on the twigs and errant leaves that he trod upon. Slowly, the stubborn gears in his mind started to turn and he began to recall the events of the last couple of weeks with more clarity than he had known he possessed. For the first time, conversations and events that he had ignored or glossed over with blithe inattentiveness were starting to make sense.

For the first time in weeks, Ron Stoppable had actually begun to get a clue about what was happening in his life.

Sort of.

"_Boy have I really misjudged Bonnie. After what I did to her in that closet, she's still going out of her way to help me get together with Kim. Of course, the worst thing is that I didn't even apologize to her! Heck, neither one of us has mentioned the closet or the next day at Bueno Nacho… She must be really embarrassed. _"

Without realizing it, Ron passed Kim's house, and he stopped for a moment to gaze at the domicile that he had often considered his second home and the residence of the one girl in the world that he was utterly devoted to. His relationship with Kim, or sudden lack thereof, weighed heavily on his mind these days. He knew, deep down inside, that he wasn't good enough for the 'girl who could do anything'. It wasn't that he felt he was totally inadequate to be around Kim, that much was obvious since they had been practically inseparable for over a decade. Ron had this feeling that if Kim was a planet, then he was a satellite, eternally circling around her orbit, but never quite managing to touch.

When he was a kid, he hadn't realized this fact, but he felt this was owed to the constraints upon relationships that children had. Hanging out, playing together, running around and being silly, were just not in the same ballpark as such mysterious teenage past times such as 'dating'. He wasn't trying to denigrate the bond that he and Kim had formed over the years, but he found it increasingly difficult as he got older to ignore the facts of the situation. Regrettably, part of the process of growing into adulthood is dealing with the increasing categorization of your life and the reduced possibilities that this entailed. Kim, or so Ron believed, might actually be the one person able to defy such a fate, but Ron wasn't so sure about himself.

For instance, at the age of seventeen, Ron Stoppable was quite sure that he'd never be President, he'd never be a famous musician, or an actor, or an athlete, or even anything more mundane, but equally prestigious, like a lawyer or a doctor. It wasn't that he was completely incapable; it was just that he had taken a long cold look at not only his abilities but the limitations of his own personality. To be blunt, he just wasn't suited for excellence.

He was fine with that.

Kim on the other hand, really wasn't. She never raged at Ron, even when she had cause to and she had done her best to humor some of his more outlandish detours into weirdness or to encourage him when he was capable, but lacking in desire to succeed, but all those things aside, Ron had learned amongst the shifting emotional sandstorms of his emerging maturity that there was a _big_ difference between dealing with a friend's failings and… a boyfriend's.

There were differences all right and the revelation felt like an arrow stabbing him in the heart.

Still, despite all this, despite knowing that he had a snowball's chance in hell, Ron soldiered on. It was, after all, in his nature; he had never given up on KP, not once in his life, and now that he was certain that he wanted to be with her _forever_ he wasn't going to give up now. Things still looked grim, with Yori's ever present hovering on his mind, with Kim herself not speaking to Ron these days and with this newest revelation that he was quite possibly, unintentionally at least, taking Bonnie's friendship for granted…

He knew that he needed to get help. He needed someone to talk to, to sort out his feelings and to work out a plan. Who could he approach? His father was hopeless; he was still trying to marry Ron off to Yori for some unknown reason. Monique would be no good; she was Kim's friend more than Ron's. Bonnie recently had been a bastion of support for Ron, but now he was afraid that he had accidentally ruined their burgeoning friendship and didn't feel comfortable turning to her. Kim, of course, would normally be his first choice but given the circumstances, was entirely out of the question. Who then? Felix perhaps? Ron shook his head. Felix was Ron's second oldest friend and a great listener, but he ruefully admitted that Felix wasn't a major hit with the ladies; owing more to the fact that he spent most of his time glued to Zombie Mayhem and not other, more obvious, limitations.

Ron sighed and tried to direct his thoughts down another avenue before he started to consider asking Ned for advice. That, he resolved, would be the first and last sign that he had gone totally insane. Ron hesitated for a long minute outside of the Possible residence and then began to turn towards his own home. He wanted to make up with Kim, to at least, be friends again, but he knew that so long as the Yori situation wasn't cleared up, he didn't have much chance of that happening.

"_Ok then, it's obvious. The first step is to figure out some way to get Yori to admit that we are not married. She'll be a tough nut to crack, too tough probably – she is a ninja after all. Dad on the other hand…_"

Ron felt, nay, Ron _knew_ that his father was involved somehow. He couldn't prove it, and the old man had been avoiding talking about it, but it didn't take a rocket scientist or a brain surgeon to figure out that Gene Stoppable, former actuary and current vice president, was at the very best, hiding a terrible secret from his family, and more importantly, from Ron.

"_That's it. I'm going to target the old man and give him both barrels. This has got to end and if he doesn't back down, then I'll take Bonnie's advice. I don't want to, but I'm not going to let anyone, even my own family, decide my life for me anymore._"

Ron puffed his chest out as he walked with determined footsteps towards the Stoppable residence. He knew that if he was going to make good on his threat that he would have to harden his heart and risk not only the wrath, but the alienation of his parents. He needed his life back and he needed it now.

-

Kim Possible flittered about her upper story bedroom like a hyperactive butterfly as she prepared for her evening rendezvous with Eric, her boyfriend. The two teens had been seeing quite a bit of each other recently, even more so now that she and Ron were on the outs, and tonight was no exception.

She felt a small pang of guilt whenever she thought of Ron and how she had treated him the last time they had spoke. Kim had known by the hangdog expression that the normally jovial boy had worn that their estrangement had been taking a heavy toll on him and in truth she felt more than a little responsible. She knew that she had overreacted, but knowing it and doing something about it were two entirely separate things.

"_This is Ron we're talking about… he's clueless, but nice, and this whole sitch can't really be his entire fault… could it?"_

Kim shuffled through an assortment of bottles on her vanity, looking for the perfect shade of either lip gloss, or eye liner, she couldn't decide. Eric had called only a half an hour before and while Kim was _thrilled_ to be going out with her hunky new boyfriend, she hadn't planned on doing anything at all tonight – so she was more than a little unprepared.

Suddenly, she remembered something.

"_That's not true I guess… I was going to call Ron._"

Kim didn't know where that voice had come from and it's soft, yet startling clarity made her pause while she rummaged through her cosmetics. She looked up at the mirror, focused on her own piercing green eyes and tried to discern where that seemingly random thought had originated from.

"_I meant to make up with him today, didn't I? I was going to call him and invite him out to Bueno Nacho and we were going to sit down and talk about…Yori and…"_

Kim could barely force herself to think it.

"… _and Bonnie fucking Rockwaller."_

Kim didn't even hear the sound of her favorite eyeliner snapping in two as she fumed with impotent rage at her school rival and nemesis. Bonnie, it seems, had had it out for her since day one, since the cheer leading tryouts even, and no matter what Kim did, no matter how many times she turned the other cheek, Bonnie was dead set on trying to ruin everything that was good in her life. Kim honestly didn't know how much longer she could put up with the constant plots and insults that Bonnie subjected her to, but she did know two things – Ron would _never_ pick Bonnie over her, and Bonnie was going to _pay_ if she hurt Ron.

"_God! What am I doing? I need to call Ron and talk some sense into him. Whatever it is that Bonnie's been planning, she's just going to use him up and throw him away. I need to…_"

Kim's mental tirade was cut short by the sound of her mother's voice rising up the stairs from the living room.

"Kim! Eric's here!"

Kim's hand that had been reaching for her phone suddenly froze and all thoughts of Ron Stoppable, Bonnie Rockwaller and her insidious plots were banished from her mind. She looked down at her hand and the remains of pencil she had broken and swore silently.

"_That was my favorite! Eric's here and I'm not even close to being ready!_"

Kim began to panic and the upper register of her voice cracked when she hollered back to her mom that she was going to be just "one more minute". Busily, she started to primp and preen in front of the mirror, her eyes occasionally glancing over to her Kimmunicator and wondering if she had the time to place a single call…

"_I'll do it after my date. I hate to say it, but Ron can wait a little bit longer. He's not going anywhere._"

Kim had decided a long time ago that Ron Stoppable was more or less a permanent fixture in her life. The idea that there would ever be some sort of deadline or window of opportunity to make peace with him was a concept so alien to her that it didn't even enter into her mind, despite the fact that she knew that Bonnie Rockwaller was actively trying to get in between them. It was either her absolute faith in Ron's loyalty, or her own emerging arrogance that caused her to quickly pick up her Kimmunicator and place it into her handbag without placing the call that she knew she should have.

Ron, after all, had always waited for her. She felt very sure at that moment that he always would.

With a coy gesture, Kim tilted her head up so that the light hanging from her ceiling illuminated her features. She cast a careful eye over the work she had done with her limited amount of time and then with a satisfied smirk, pronounced it, "Good enough".She and Eric were supposed to go to a movie tonight anyway, so it wasn't like her face had to be absolutely _impeccable_.

"Kim!" her mother's voice came from downstairs.

"Coming!" she rejoined as she quickly spun around to join her boyfriend downstairs. Immediately she heard a crash that was preceded by a tug on her purse. The sound caused her to jump a little bit. Looking backwards, Kim noticed that she had accidentally caught her hand bag on one of the pictures that adorned her bureau. Sighing to herself and placing her bag on her bed, Kim squatted down carefully to retrieve the framed photo. It was a picture of her and Ron, one of her favorites, from when they were children.

Without warning Kim was caught up in a wave of nostalgia and for a moment it seemed like she was about to avoid making one of the worst mistakes of her life. Unfortunately however, her boyfriend's voice carried into the air…

"Kim, we're going to be late for the movie!"

Kim looked at the photo for a second, and then made a snap decision.

"_Sigh. I'm going to have to get a new frame. Not tonight though, I have a date to go on first!"_

Kim set the picture down where it had fallen from, not even noticing that she had appropriately set it face down.

-

Yori put the interminable bane of her existence, better known as her U.S. History textbook, back into her school bag and breathed a sigh of relief. Yamanouchi, besides training ninjas, had quite the rigorous academic curriculum, but unfortunately for Yori, the history they taught there tended to be more of the local variety. She was thankful that Steve Barkin generally taught from the book instead of relying upon students to actually _remember_ material that they had previously learned because as it was, she was just barely getting by.

Heck, she had at one point even asked _Ron's_ help with her homework. She giggled at that thought – it wasn't that Ron was dumb, far from it actually; it was just that he only showed his true genius when it came to things that interested him and it seemed that most of his school classes _didn't _fall into this category. Yori wasn't surprised by this actually, she had often mused that the most brilliant of men were often bored and not interested in the mundane topics that filled the days and lives of common people. When it came to Ron Stoppable, Yori was utterly certain that his genius would be tied to his destiny and she wanted more than anything to be a part of it.

With a long sigh, Yori flopped backwards onto the enormous bed that she had placed in the room that she now shared with Ron. It was easily big enough for four people, but she lamented that it had never seen more than one resident at a time. Sadly she noted that Ron's sleeping bag and pillows were still located in the corner of the bedroom where they had been placed the first night she had shown up.

"_I knew this was going to be hard, but I didn't know it would be impossible!"_

She didn't understand why Ron kept avoiding her advances. Certainly it wasn't because he didn't find her attractive – she had done more than enough testing of that theory with her impromptu displays of semi-nudity and total disregard for knocking before entering bathrooms. No, there was something else here, some other _thing_ that was keeping the two teenagers apart, and try as she might, Yori was no closer now than she had been when she arrived at solving this thorny problem.

"_I'm running out of time, if I don't get Ron-san to agree to come back with me to Japan then I will have to…_"

A sob started to well in her throat and she found herself unable to complete the thought. Instead she closed her eyes tightly and attempted to fight back the tears that she felt building whenever her mind turned to the circumstances under which she had left her homeland. She knew that it was unfair of her to put this burden on Ron, but she also felt that it was for the best, for both him and her. Certainly it was part of Ron's destiny as the Chosen One to someday run the Yamanouchi clan, if it came now or later it would not make much difference in the long run, but for _now_, in the short term, it could make a world of difference. There were forces at play in the corners of the shadowy politics of the ninja clan that even Yori as an insider was barely able to comprehend, but she knew bad road when she saw it. Ron, she had surmised, could save them all.

"_He will come around. I have to believe that he will. I will do whatever I have to, I will be the best, most perfect, obedient wife on the planet if he would only come with me. It would be better if he would make this choice on his own, but I will do whatever I must, sacrifice whatever I must and eventually I will win Ron-san's heart. He will come to love me, I know he will, he's too kind not to."_

Yori clung to these thoughts like a sailor to the rails in the midst of a tempest. They were the only things that made the pain and indecision about her current mission tolerable and without them she knew that her spirit would be crushed in defeat. The rejection that she had been suffering so far at the hands of Ron had taken it's toll on her, but she at least held out hope that things would improve eventually if only she could just get him to see how dedicated she was to him.

How dedicated she was to the Chosen One.

These thoughts occupied her mind when her acute hearing picked up the sound of the front door to the Stoppable house opening. She knew that Ron's parents, Gene and Meryl, were already accounted for, so the only other person who could possibly be arriving unannounced would be Ron. A quirky little smile graced her otherwise elegant lips and she bounced up from the bed, intent on running down to welcome Ron home. Perhaps, she hoped, tonight would be the night they finally made some progress.

"_There's always a chance. Fight Yori! Gambate!_" she thought to herself as she nimbly traversed down the second storey stairs.

Yori poked her head around the corner of the stairway entrance and glanced into the foyer and was surprised to see it empty. Usually when Ron came home, the first thing he did was throw his book bag on the floor and walk over to the couch to watch T.V. In fact, this was the only time that she could remember in the last couple of weeks where he had broken that routine. She wondered if perhaps he had been hungry and gone to the kitchen for a snack and was just about to walk off in that direction when she heard muffled talking from the far end of the living room.

Yori slowly walked closer and she realized that the sound was coming from the door that separated the main house from the Stoppable's garage. As she approached, the voices started to become clearer.

"_How come you keep trying to change the subject?_" came the first voice. Yori instantly knew it was Ron.

"_I'm not doing anything of the sort son. I'm just saying that there are things going on here that you don't understand and they'll take time to fix…_" The second voice was obviously Ron's father.

"_Well, why don't you make me understand? I'm sick of getting the push off on this every time I try to talk to you and mom about this!"_ Ron was shouting now, and Yori didn't have to struggle as much to hear him.

"_Ronald! Just put up with it for a little while longer and I promise you we'll clear the situation up._"

There was a sound from the garage, like a trashcan being kicked and some low muttering that Yori was unable to make out.

"_That's it! I've had it! I can't wait any longer on this; it's ruining my life__**now**_!"

"_There's no need to be melodramatic. Is it really that bad? She's a very sweet and pretty girl. You know Ronald if I was your age…_"

Gene's voice was immediately cut off by Ron who practically bellowed at his father.

"_Why don't you, or mom, or Kim get it? I don't care! I'm not in love with Yori! I've never been in love with Yori and I never WILL be in love with Yori!"_

Yori had been pressing her ear to the door so as to eavesdrop on the two men and when she had heard Ron's pronouncement that he would never love her, she found herself feeling as if she had just been kicked in the chest, directly over the heart to be exact. She had known that Ron was resistant to the idea of being with her, but she had never dreamed that she would hear words like that coming out of his mouth. She had tried so hard, sacrificed so much for his sake and for the sake of Yamanouchi, only to hear him say that he would never love her…

She crumpled to the floor in a heap, her legs folding under her as she leaned against the door. Ron and his father were still talking, but for some reason Yori couldn't make out what they were saying. To her, their voices sounded like they were talking under water. She didn't even notice it when her breath started to become shallow and the sound of the conversation in the next room was replaced by a ringing in her ears. She wrapped her arms around her chest and huddled there on the floor for long minutes as she tried to put the pieces of her world back together.

Unfortunately, she had no idea where to start.

-

Gene Stoppable clutched his right arm in a vice like grip. He was a man that didn't yell often and in fact he prided himself on his level headed demeanor, but the truth was this wasn't so much a natural personality trait of his as much as it was dictated by the nature of his diagnosed heart disease. Already he could feel the numbness and the pain building up inside him and he fumbled around in his pocket for a small metal canister that contained his heart medication.

Gene swallowed the tiny blue pill and then leaned against his car, trying to both catch his breath and calm his nerves. He knew that his son was right, that what he was currently doing to the boy was nearly unforgivable, but he hadn't expected Ron to be so… forceful about it. Until this moment Gene had always considered Ron to be _his_ son, in both temperament and demeanor and now he was more than a little shocked to discover that the boy had evidently picked up some of his wife Meryl's fiery temper.

"_I need to sort this out as soon as I can. Even if it means losing my job, that's still far better than alienating my son, my wife and even hurting that poor girl's feelings. Lord, I never expected Ronald to threaten going to the police. Child protective services? I guess he's right – he's a minor and the whole thing is so shady that it'll be picked apart in seconds._"

Gene started to feel his pulse slowing back down to normal and he reached into his shirt to pull out a triangle folded handkerchief that he often used to wipe the perspiration from his forehead. He had never seen his boy so angry before and while he was still surprised, he had to admit that in some ways he was a little glad. One of his major concerns in his life had been that his boy was a little bit too docile for his own good, almost to the point of being a house pet instead of a young man. He supposed it was to be expected, what with the way that he always followed around that Possible girl. It wasn't that Gene thought that Kim was a bad influence on Ron, quite the opposite actually; it was just that her personality was so overpowering that Ron's own development would be stunted.

"_Well, I suppose that's a concern that I can forget about!_"

Gene rubbed his eyes a couple of times, languidly allowing his hand to brush across his face and then replaced his handkerchief in his pocket. He felt sufficiently calm now and he knew that he needed to keep his blood pressure under control for the imminent confrontation with his wife. He was sure that Meryl would be supportive of Ron's position, but he also knew that she was going to be less than thrilled when he informed her that it could quite likely cost him his job.

He steeled his nerves and approached the door leading back into the house. Just as his hand reached for the doorknob he thought that he heard a sound on the other side, but when he opened it, he found no one there.

"Odd." He spoke aloud to no one in particular as he went to find his wife and face the music.

-

A/N: Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter. It took me quite a bit longer to write than I had anticipated, but I was feeling that my story was losing its way so I made a resolution to tighten up the plot a bit so that we could see some forward momentum here. From now on the installments should feature a lot more progression and definite resolutions with a couple of new story elements being introduced in the next couple of chapters.

Also, I would like to thank everyone who nominated my story, Ron Stoppable: Ultimate Monkey Master for a Fannie award. For those of you who do not know what a Fannie is, I suppose you can think of it as the Oscars for Kim Possible fan fiction writers. My story is up for three awards, **Best Story Overall**, **Best Novel-Sized** and **Best Action/Adventure**. If you haven't read this story please check out my profile where you will find not only a link to the story, but also links to the Fannie polls where you can vote for me if you so choose!

Once again, thanks to each and every one of you for reading and for your comments on my work (I love getting reviews!) and especially for the Fannie nomination.

Cheers,

QC

PS: Special thanks to**Noobfish** for pre-reading this chapter and helping me make it semi-presentable to you guys. If my writing is improving, then you have him to thank.


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